World record 26 terabits per second data transmission achieved

With video content consuming ever more bandwidth, the need for faster data transmission rates has never been greater. Now a team of scientists at Germany's Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) are claiming a world record in data transmission with the successful encoding of data at a rate of 26 terabits per second on a single laser beam and transmitting it over a distance of 50 km (31 miles). The scientists claim this is the largest data volume ever transported on a laser beam and enables the transmission of 700 DVD's worth of content in just one second.


With no electronic processing methods available for a data rate of 26 terabits per second, the team developed a new opto-electric data decoding process. This process relies on purely optical calculations to break down the initial high data rate into smaller bit rates that can then be processed electrically. The record-breaking data encoding also employed the orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) scheme based on Fast Fourier Transformation (FFT) mathematical routines that is commonly used in mobile communications networks including digital TV and audio broadcasts.


Because energy is required for the laser and a few process steps only, the team says the new method is not only extremely fast, but also very energy efficient.


"Our result shows that physical limits are not yet exceeded even at extremely high data rates," says Professor Jürg Leuthold, who led the KIT experiment. "A few years ago, data rates of 26 terabits per second were deemed utopian even for systems with many lasers and there would not have been any applications. With 26 terabits per second, it would have been possible to transmit up to 400 million telephone calls at the same time. Nobody needed this at that time. Today, the situation is different."


The latest breakthrough follows on from the previous high-speed data transmission record set by the KIT scientists in 2010, when they successfully exceeded the data rate of 10 terabits (or 10,000 billion bits) per second.


The KIT experiment involved companies and scientists from all over Europe, including members of the staff of Agilent and Micram Deutschland, Time-Bandwidth Switzerland, Finisar Israel, and the University of Southampton in Great Britain. The experiment is detailed in the journal Nature Photonics.

Low-cost solar lanterns for poor students

With charging lights costing big bucks, poor students are still left out with two options—either to study under a kerosene lantern or go for a candle. Keeping in view such students, who study in dark, D. Light Company rolled out world’s cheapest lantern that runs with solar energy a few years ago and now it is been reported that the project has been successful. I feel so privileged to write a review about the product that is not aimed at deep pockets but brainy muffs. A special report!


Named S1, the solar lantern is very bright and can provide enough light so that your eyes don’t come under pressure while reading in dark. This solar lantern is available for less than eight USD. A day’s charging will enable the light to glow for about four hours. The solar. lantern has got an LED bulb. It is a a very small device that can be carried even in the pocket. Reportedly, this lantern has become a big hit in the Indian market with every single student among a group of 275 students switching to it. The survey by D. Light in India claimed that all the students, who used S1 have shown better results comparatively.


SI solar lantern, though aimed at students, anyone can go for it. It is undoubtedly a good product. Cheaper price element apart, one should always try to encourage such eco-friendly goods. However, there’s another product from the same company, which may be much more useful to others. S250, which also runs with solar energy is a two-in-one product. It acts as a lamp as well as mobile charger. I suggest you guys to switch to such eco-friendly products. Above all, eco-friendly goods are also pocket-friendly.

New 3D transistor design to speed up your PC

Intel announced on 4/5/11 Wednesday that it had again found a way to make computer chips that could process information more quickly and with less power in less space.

The transistors on computer chips — whether for PCs or smartphones — have been designed in essentially the same way since 1959 when Robert Noyce, Intel's co-founder, and Jack Kilby of Texas Instruments independently invented the first integrated circuits that became the basic building block of electronic devices in the information age.

These early transistors were built on a flat surface. But Intel is now building up. When the space between the billions of tiny electronic switches on the flat surface of a computer chip is measured in the width of just dozens of atoms, designers needed the third dimension to find more room.

The company has already begun making its microprocessors using a new 3D transistor design, called a Finfet (for fin field-effect transistor), which is based around a remarkably small pillar , or fin, of silicon that rises above the surface of the chip. Intel , based in Santa Clara, California , plans to enter general production based on the new technology some time later this year.

Although the company did not give technical details about its new process in its Wednesday announcement, it said that it expected to be able to make chips that run as much as 37% faster in low-voltage applications and it would be able to cut power consumption as much as 50%.

Intel currently uses a photolithographic process to make a chip, in which the smallest feature on the chip is just 32 nanometers, a level of microscopic manufacture that was reached in 2009. (By comparison a human red blood cell is 7,500 nanometers in width and a strand of DNA is 2.5 nanometers .) "Intel is on track for 22-nanometer manufacturing later this year," said Mark T Bohr, an Intel senior fellow and the scientist who has overseen the effort to develop the next generation of smaller transistors.

The company's engineers said that they now felt confident that they would be able to solve the challenges of making chips through at least the 10-nanometer generation, which is likely to happen in 2015.

Make energy by your hands with portable self-charger

Korean designer Seoung Won Shin reminding us of a beautiful creature "Dolphins" through his latest creation. He has developed a dolphin shaped portable self-charger that gives you energy anywhere, anytime.
This innovative charger gives you green energy to juice up your gadgets like cell phones and MP3 players. All you have to do is repeatedly press the dolphin-like face of the charger to produce electrical charge, which powers gadgets via a USB post. The trendy power house comes in six different shades to suit your style. So, now make clean energy by your hands.