Successful Test Demonstrated World’s Fastest Internet

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Australian researchers have successfully tested and recorded the world’s fastest internet data speed of 44.2Tbps using a single optical chip known as a micro-comb.  The team succeeded in demonstrating the ability for fibres already in the ground to be the backbone of communications networks. Fast internet speeds achieved could be used for self-driving cars and future transportation as well as help the medicine, education, finance and e-commerce industries.

The data speed achieved has the capacity to support high-speed internet connections of 1.8 million households in Melbourne, and users can download 1,000 HD movies in seconds.

According to the researchers from Monash, Swinburne, and RMIT universities, the micro-comb, which is touted to be a smaller and lighter device than existing telecommunications hardware, was used to replace 80 infrared lasers.

They did this by placing the micro-comb in 76.6km of installed dark optical fibres between RMIT’s Melbourne city campus and Monash University’s Clayton campus. The micro-comb was used to mimic a rainbow of infrared lasers so that each ‘laser’ has the capacity to be used as a separate communications channel.

To simulate peak internet usage during testing, the researchers sent maximum data through each channel across 4THz of bandwidth, according to zdnet.com.

The next stage of the project is to scale up the current transmitters from hundreds of gigabytes per second towards tens of terabytes per second without increasing size, weight, or cost.

The findings were published in the Nature Communications journal.