(June 26,
2012) USC-led
team demonstrates that beams of light can be twisted and combined to transmit
data at dramatically increased speeds
A
multi-national team led by USC with researchers hailing from the U.S., China,
Pakistan and Israel has developed a system of transmitting data using twisted
beams of light at ultra-high speeds – up to 2.56 terabits per second.
To put that
in perspective, broadband cable (which you probably used to download this)
supports up to about 30 megabits per second. The twisted-light system transmits
more than 85,000 times more data per second.
Their work
might be used to build high-speed satellite communication links, short
free-space terrestrial links, or potentially be adapted for use in the fiber
optic cables that are used by some Internet service providers.