New Delhi : Call it an ultimate tech art: NASA has turned Mona Lisa into the first digital image to be transmitted via laser beam from Earth to a spacecraft in lunar orbit, nearly 240,000 miles away.

A first in laser communication, the laser signal was fired from an installation in Maryland, USA, and as received as far as 384,400 km away by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been orbiting since 2009.

According to NASA scientists, the Mona Lisa transmission is a major advancement in laser communication for interplanetary spacecraft.

“This is the first time anyone has achieved one-way laser communication at planetary distances,” David Smith, a researcher working with the LRO’s Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter — which received the Mona Lisa message — said in a statement. “In the near future, this type of simple laser communication might serve as a backup for the radio communication that satellites use. In the more distance future, it may allow communication at higher data rates than present radio links can provide.”

Here’s how they did it: the team divided the famous da Vinci painting into sections measuring 150 by 200 pixels and then transmitted them via the pulsing of the laser to the orbiter at a data rate of about 300 bits per second.

After receiving the image, the lunar orbiter reconstructed the photo, and corrected the distortions and then sent the image back to Earth using its its normal form of communication: radio waves.

Later this year, the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer will launch toward the moon and focus on mapping the lunar atmosphere and environment.