Transmit more than 20 times the global Internet traffic in one second? It is now possible

A team of engineers in Japan has reached a milestone that rarely occurs anymore, by transmitting more than 20 times the global Internet traffic per second through a single optical fiber.

They have recorded an impressive speed of 22.9 petabits per secondwhich is equivalent to one million gigabits and allows global Internet traffic to be transmitted 22 times per second.

So you can get an idea of ​​how fast this speed, one petabit, is equivalent to a thousand terabits, which in turn is equivalent to one million gigabits, which is the same as one billion megabits.

In Spain, a fast connection offers between 500 and 600 Mbs, although it is increasingly common to see operators that offer 1 Gbps – 1,000 Mbs – and we are even seeing offers of 10 Gbps, even with all that, imagine.

22 times the global Internet traffic per second over a single optical fiber

Just remember, and to make the comparison, that a little over a year ago, a single computer chip was able to transmit the exact record figure of 1.84 petabits of data per second, sufficient bandwidth, as they commented, to download 230 million photos in that time, and more traffic than travels through the entire Internet backbone per second.

Subsequently, 1.53 petabits per second were transmitted over standard fiber cable, a record for any standard cladding diameter (0.125 mm) optical fiber to date.

Now, this achievement, led by Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT), redefines the limits of data transmission speed and promises great advances in the connectivity of the future.

This revolutionary breakthrough was not achieved through conventional methods, but through the implementation of new technologies. Instead of relying on a single core for data transmission, the optical fiber used contains 38 cores, each capable of transmitting data in three different modes.

This approach multiplies capacity by offering 114 spatial channels, with each spatial channel including three wavelength bands—S, C, and L—resulting in an impressive bandwidth of 18.8 terahertz.

Despite the surprising speed achieved, the NICT team recognizes that There are still loose ends to tie up and a lot of work ahead if we want to obtain such speeds on a large scale. for the population, so for the moment we will have to wait and settle for what currently exists.