Wow. Laser puts record data rate through fibre - Equivalent of Library of Congress collection in 10 seconds

via bbc.co.uk

"Researchers have set a new record for the rate of data transfer using a single laser: 26 terabits per second.

At those speeds, the entire Library of Congress collections could be sent down an optical fibre in 10 seconds.

The trick is to use what is known as a "fast Fourier transform" to unpick more than 300 separate colours of light in a laser beam, each encoded with its own string of information.

The technique is described in the journal Nature Photonics.

The push for higher data rates in light-based telecommunications technologies has seen a number of significant leaps in recent years.

While the earliest optical fibre technologies encoded a string of data as "wiggles" within a single colour of light sent down a fibre, newer approaches have used a number of tricks to increase data rates..."

Posted via email from Siobhan O'Flynn's 1001 Tales