The Europeans are looking to upgrade their ExoMars lander to include an orbiter that would be used to communicate back to Earth. Not including the orbiter would force the lander to rely on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, which will already be used to ferry messages from America's own Mars Science Laboratory. Read the full story.

Communicating with interplanetary space craft is difficult thanks to the distances involved and the resulting delays in transmitting data. Researchers hope to improve the ease and reliability of communication through a deep space internet based on delay-tolerant networking. Read the full story.

Radio Active goes temporarily political with a review of Alan Moore and David Lloyd's V for Vendetta graphic novel. But before I launch off on that tangent, I've got news about the flu that ravaged Nuketown, updates on some of my freelance projects, and a bunch of new sites of note, including the Battlestar Galatica wiki, the Liberty & Culture blog, an excellent conversation about "Common Sense" gaming via UncleBear.com and a cool write-up on virtual desktops for GMs from TreasureTables.org.