The world record for data transmission has been broken by a research team from Germany and Japan, who have been successful in sending a signal at 2.56 terabits per second, utilising a 160km fibre optic link. Techs from the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications in Berlin and from Fujitsu in Japan doubled the previous benchmark of 1.28Tbps. The rate of 2.56 terabits per second is more than 50 times faster than the fastest commercial broadband connections available today. Now when is it getting installed in my home?
"Faster data rates are hugely important for tomorrow's telecommunications," explained Professor Hans-Georg Weber from the Fraunhofer Institute for Telecommunications, who led the research. Weber said the high performance systems the researchers are developing will be needed once the growth in internet traffic pushes up the necessary speed of back haul links into the terabit range.