Sumitomo Electric Achieves World Record With Optical Fiber

Sumitomo Electric and the National Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT) recently set a new global record for long-distance, high-capacity transmission in optical fiber communications. The companies achieved data transmission at 1.02 petabits per second over 1,808 km utilizing Sumitomo’s 19-core optical fiber with a standard 0.125 mm cladding diameter.

Per Sumitomo Electric’s press release, “In this demonstration, Sumitomo Electric was responsible for the design and manufacture of a coupled 19-core optical fiber that features a standard cladding diameter, achieving a reduction in optical fiber losses across multiple wavelength ranges (the C-band and the L-band) by optimizing the structure and arrangement of the cores. Meanwhile, NICT was responsible for building a transmission system that maximizes the performance of the fiber, as well as developing and demonstrating an optical amplification relay function capable of simultaneously amplifying signals from all 19 cores.”

This technology is anticipated to help with the growth of communication capacity and the long-range extension of optical communication infrastructure within the future, as it is expected for communication demand to increase.