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NASA’s recent focus for human spaceflight has been a build-up of capability towards landing humans on Mars. The advancement of key technologies currently underway has a final goal of being able to provide a sustained human presence on the Red Planet. This final goal will need to be supported by a complete infrastructure, both in space and on the ground. The telecommunications capability required for a manned Mars mission will far exceed that of any robotic endeavor to date.

This report outlines a three phase architecture with corresponding ground infrastructure, in which a slow build-up of assets will lead to an effective network for Mars communications. This system will support a continued robotic presence and the eventual arrival of humans with high data rate communications capability and multiple layers of redundancy.