By C. Perera, JadeTimes News
Deep within a warehouse at CERN, home of the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland, two network engineers experienced a tense moment as they pressed a button. Instantly, text on a black background flashed on the screen, confirming their success. “There was high fiving involved,” recalls Joachim Opdenakker from SURF, a Dutch IT association for educational and research institutions. He and his colleague Edwin Verheul had just established a new data link between the LHC and data storage sites in the Netherlands.
This data link, capable of reaching speeds of 800 gigabits per second over 11,000 times faster than the average UK home broadband speed aims to enhance scientist's access to LHC experiment results. A subsequent test in March, using specialized equipment from Nokia, confirmed these speeds were achievable. Verheul explains the limited availability of Nokia’s transponder, likening it to a "celebrity," highlighting the tight scheduling for its use.
The duplex cable from CERN to the Netherlands, nearly 1,650 kilometers long, passes through Geneva, Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam. The challenge in reaching 800 Gbps involved maintaining the light pulses's power levels over this distance, requiring amplification at various points. Each subatomic particle collision at the LHC generates about one petabyte of data per second, enough to fill 220,000 DVDs. With an upgrade expected by 2029, the LHC anticipates producing even more data.
James Watt, senior vice president at Nokia, notes that the upgrade will increase the number of collisions by at least a factor of five. However, with advancements in technology, 800 Gbps might soon seem slow. In November, researchers in Japan broke the world speed record for data transmission, reaching an astonishing 22.9 petabits per second. This bandwidth could theoretically supply every person on the planet with a Netflix stream and more.
This record was achieved using 19 core fibre optic cable over 13 kilometers in a lab setting, demonstrating the feasibility of such speeds. Dr. Chigo Okonkwo from Eindhoven University of Technology, who was involved in the project, emphasizes the importance of data integrity during transmission.
Older fiber optics are expensive to replace, making it crucial to extend their lifespan. Researchers at Aston University, including Wladek Forysiak, achieved speeds of around 402 terabits per second over a 50 kilometer optical fiber with one core by using more wavelengths of light than usual. This approach could be easier to implement than replacing extensive lengths of cable.
Future activities, such as those in the metaverse, might require extreme bandwidth. Martin Creaner from the World Broadband Association anticipates home broadband connections reaching up to 50 Gbps by 2030. However, reliability might be more critical than speed for applications like remote robotic surgery.
Dr. Okonkwo argues that training AI will increasingly demand moving large datasets quickly. Ian Phillips from Aston University believes bandwidth tends to find its applications once available, as “humanity finds a way of consuming it.”
Lane Burdette, a research analyst at TeleGeography, notes the rapidly growing demand for bandwidth, currently increasing by about 30% annually on transatlantic fiber optic cables. Content provision social media, cloud services, and video streaming is consuming more bandwidth, now accounting for 75% of international bandwidth, up from 15% in the early 2010s.
In the UK, improving internet speeds remains a challenge. While most home users can now access gigabit per second speeds, only about a third of broadband customers are opting for this technology. Andrew Kernahan from the Internet Service Providers Association mentions the lack of a “killer app” requiring such speeds, though this might change with the increasing consumption of TV via the internet. Raising awareness of the potential uses of the infrastructure is crucial.
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