Slashdot Mirror
Researchers Transmit Optical Data at 16.4 Tbps 2550km
Stony Stevenson writes "The goal of 100 Gbps Ethernet transmission is closer to reality with the announcement Wednesday that Alcatel-Lucent researchers have recorded an optical transmission record along with three photonic integrated circuits. Carried out by researchers in Bell Labs in Villarceaux, France, the successful transmission of 16.4 Tbps of optical data over 2,550 km was assisted by Alcatel's Thales' III-V Lab and Kylia, an optical solution company. The researchers utilized 164 wavelength-division multiplexed channels modulated at 100-Gbps in the effort."
(14 * 24 * 60 * 60) / (20 / 2.2) = 123,984 LoCs/fortnight
(total seconds per fortnight)
14 days per fortnight
24 hours per day
60 minutes per hour
60 seconds per minute
all over
(seconds per Library of Congress transferred)
20 terabytes per second (one LoC/second)
2.05 terabytes per second (16.4 terabits per second
They had 164 lasers with different colours sending 100 Gbps EACH over the same fiber, splitting the colours apart again at the other end with what probably is a little more advanced than a prism.
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
Its called dense wave division multiplexing, or DWDM. You take independent links (in this case 100Gig links), and transmit each of them on a slightly different wavelength of light called a Lambda. Since optic is looking for a specific wavelength, you can now run many "virtual links" per physical fibre. This is the standard technology for most Telcos. The innovation here is that they are doing this with 100Gig transceivers, and they have chipsets fast enough to combine the different lambda's back together into on high speed link. And yes, you can now let the Lambda Lambda Lambda jokes fly
Colin McNamara - CCIE #18233 "The difficult we do immediately, the impossible just takes a little longer"