Academics from the Aston Institute of Photonics Research have set a new record by transmitting data at 402 terabits per second, surpassing their previous record of 301 terabits per second. They achieved this feat by building the first optical transmission system operating in six wavelength bands.
Aston University researchers and their international team have set a new data transmission record of 402 terabits per second using standard optical fibre, potentially stabilizing broadband costs as demand increases.
Researchers at Aston University, in collaboration with a team, have achieved a new record by transmitting data at a speed of 402 terabits per second through commercially available optical fibers. This achievement surpasses their previous record set in March 2024, where they managed to send data at 301 terabits per second, equivalent to 301,000,000 megabits per second, using a single standard optical fiber.
According to the researchers, “When compared to Netflix’s Internet connection speed recommendations of 3 Mbit/s or higher for watching an HD movie, this speed is over 100 million times faster.”
The speed was achieved by using a wider spectrum, using six bands instead of the previous four, which increased the capacity for sharing data. Usually only one or two strips are used. The international research team included Professor Wladek Forysiak and Dr Ian Philips, who are members of the University’s Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies (AIPT). Led by the Photonic Network Laboratory of the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), which is based in Tokyo, Japan, the team also includes Nokia Bell Laboratories in the US.
Together they achieved the feat by building the first optical transmission system covering the six wavelength bands (O, E, S, C, L and U) used in fiber optic communication. Aston University specifically contributed by building an array of U-band Raman amplifiers, the longest part of the combined wavelength spectrum, where conventional doped fiber amplifiers are currently unavailable from commercial sources.
Dr. Ian Phillips. Credit: Dr. Ian Phillips
Advantages of using standard fibers
Optical fibers are small strands of glass tubes that pass information using light, unlike ordinary copper cables that cannot carry data at such speeds. In addition to increasing capacity by roughly a third, the technique uses so-called “standard fiber” that is already deployed in large quantities around the world, so there would be no need to install new specialized cables.
As demand for data from businesses and individuals increases, this new breakthrough could help keep broadband prices stable despite an improvement in capacity and speed.
Dr Philips of Aston University said: “This discovery could help increase the capacity in a single fiber so that the world has a higher performance system. The newly developed technology is expected to make a significant contribution to expanding the communication capacity of optical communication infrastructure as future data services rapidly increase demand.”
His colleague Professor Wladek Forysiak added: “This is a ‘heroic experiment’ made possible by a multinational team effort and the very latest technical advances in telecommunications research laboratories from around the world.”
The results of the experiment were accepted as a post-deadline paper at the 47th International Conference on Optical Fiber Communications (OFC 2024) in the US on March 28.
To help support some of its work in this area, Aston University has received funding from the EPSRC (UKRI), the Royal Society (RS exchange grant with NICT) and the EU (European Training Network).