Researchers at the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland have discovered a way to increase the capacity of fiber optic cables by optimizing the shape of each photonic pulse.
The breakthrough produces “Nyquist sinc pulses” almost perfectly. The pulses have a pointed shape, which enables them “to fit together tightly like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.” By reducing the spacing between pulses, more data can be transmitted in the same period. The researchers claim a 10X improvement in throughput using a simple laser and modulator to generate a pulse that is more than 99% perfect.
“These pulses have a shape that’s more pointed, making it possible to fit them together, a little bit like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle lock together,” says Camille Brès of the Photonics Systems Laboratory (PHOSL). “There is of course some interference, but not at the locations where we actually read the data.”
http://actu.epfl.ch/news/ten-times-more-throughput-on-optic-fibers/
