Researchers in Australia record enormous breakthrough in internet speeds

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Researchers in Australia unlocked internet speeds high enough to download "more than 1,000 high-definition movies in less than a second," said BBC​. Using a single fiber-optic wire linked between two campuses in Melbourne, the team "logged a data speed of 44.2 terabits per second," or roughly a million times faster than the average internet speed in the U.S.

They did it using a device called a micro-comb that replaces the 80 or so lasers in modern fiber-optic telecom equipment. While the technology is unlikely to boost our Netflix downloads anytime soon, that fact that such speed was achieved on existing internet infrastructure suggests the fibers "already in the ground" can continue to "be the backbone of communications networks now and in the future," one of the scientists said.

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