Nokia Bell Labs sets new fiber optics speed record

<h2>Nokia Bell Labs sets new fiber optics speed record</h2> <p><strong>Murray Hill, N.J. – March 13, 2020</strong> – Nokia Bell Labs announced it has set a new world record for the highest single carrier bit rate: 1.52 Terabits per second (Tbit/s) over 80 km of standard single mode fiber. This achievement is equivalent to simultaneously streaming 1.5 million YouTube videos and represents a fourfold increase over current state-of-the-art market capabilities of approximately 400 Gigabits per second.</p> <p>This breakthrough, along with other optical networking innovations, is intended to enhance Nokia's ability to develop networks for the 5G era. These networks must meet the exponentially growing demands for data, capacity, and low latency driven by industrial Internet of Things applications and consumer services. Several of these advancements were presented at the Optical Fiber Communications Conference & Exhibition (OFC) in San Diego.</p> <p>Marcus Weldon, Nokia CTO and President of Nokia Bell Labs, highlighted the ongoing commitment to pushing optical communication boundaries. "Our latest world records in optical research are yet another proof point that we are inventing even faster and more robust networks that will underpin the next industrial revolution," Weldon stated.</p> <p>The research team also set a new data-rate world record for directly modulated lasers (DML), which are critical for low-cost, high-speed applications like data center interconnects. The DML team achieved a record data rate exceeding 400 Gbit/s for links up to 15 km.</p> <p>Further developments include advancements in spatial-division multiplexing (SDM) and novel modulation formats utilizing neural networks to improve the performance of submarine cable systems.</p>