Researchers are developing a new WiFi system that could offer "100 times faster" internet surfing!
Dutch researchers from Eindhoven University of Technology claim to have developed a wireless network, based on harmless infrared rays, that can achieve WiFi at the lightning speed of 42.8 Gbit/s at a distance of 2.5 meters, which is 100 times faster than existing Wi-Fi networks. This innovation could help solve common issues such as capacity and bandwidth, as users will consume even more data in the future. It also has the ability to support more devices.
The system designed in Eindhoven is simple and inexpensive. The wireless data comes from a few central "light antennas", which could be installed on the roof of a business or home and would be able to direct with great precision the rays of light provided by an optical fiber.
By changing the wavelengths of light, the direction of the light beam also changes. For example, if a user moves out of the wavelength of one of the antennas, the signal will pass to the other light antenna. The user's devices can be identified by the radio signals they transmit, so that the network knows which antenna to use. The report also states that the infrared network will not face any interference from other nearby WiFi networks. The system is also safe for users, as it uses a wavelength that is harmless to the retina.
While current WiFi uses radio signals at a frequency of 2.5 or 5 gigahertz, the new system relies on infrared wavelengths of 1500 nanometers or more. This light has frequencies that are thousands of times higher, around 200 terahertz, which makes the data capacity of the light beams much greater.
The team compares this to the average connection in the Netherlands, which is two thousand times slower (17.6 Mbit/s). Also, the best systems available today can only achieve a total of 300 Mbit/s, which is about a hundred times slower than the speed per beam of light of the new network.
To date, the new WiFi system uses light rays only for downloading. Uploading is still done using radio signals, as most applications require much less capacity for uploading.
