1 million Gbps..... Yes please!

So a bunch of researchers have achieved new internet speed records, achieving a connection of more than 1 million Gbps – or 1 petabits per second.

These fellows at Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology announced the new record, increasing their previous record set in December 2020 that touched 1 Pbps, but this speed was now sustained.

This was done using 15-mode optical fibre, which is sadly not currently used in your standard fibre-to-the-home connection. It required complex multiple-input-multiple-output (MIMO) digital signal processing to unscramble data signals multiplexed during transmission. This technology cannot be applied in commercial use in its current state, as this MIMO needs dedicated integrated circuits which isn’t feasible at scale.

It is a world apart from the fastest available commercial fibre connection, which is now 25Gbps. However, the researchers have said that they believe their tech could be compatible with conventional fibre infrastructure with some "tinkering". They believe it could address the explosive increase in data traffic from information and communication services beyond 5G.

Through wide-band wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) technology, the researchers enabled 801 parallel wavelength channels, giving them access to a record 20THz optical bandwidth. That consisted of 335 wavelengths in the S-band, 200 in the C-band, and 266 in the L-band, each providing 25GHz.