Google sends TPU into space, AI writes back a poem from orbit.

Beating AI News Flash: Google CEO Pichai announced that the Project Suncatcher prototype satellite launched in early October completed AI inference in space using a data-center-grade TPU for the first time and transmitted the results back to Earth.

Engineers sent a prompt from the ground instructing the TPU on the satellite to run Gemma 4 and write a haiku about space. As the satellite passed near Svalbard, Norway, it transmitted back a three-line poem:

*Blue marble below*

*Data streams in silent grace*

*Starlight feeds my core.*

"Beneath lies the blue planet,

Data streams silently through,

Starlight nourishes my core."

The satellite carries 4 TPUs, but due to power supply constraints, it can currently run only 1 of them at a time, for about 20 minutes each time. Although space is cold, there is no air to help dissipate heat from the chips, so heat can only be radiated outward through heat pipes and radiators. The impact of cosmic radiation on chip operation also requires further testing.

In fact, AI has already been to space. Last December, U.S. space computing startup Starcloud ran Gemma in orbit using an NVIDIA H100 and even trained a small language model. This time, Google switched to its own TPU, and the next challenges to solve are long-term stable chip operation and how multiple satellites can perform collaborative computing.