Today a user using the internet has a tough time downloading a file of 100MB. But the time is not far away when net users all around the world will be able to download or send files easily up to the size of 10GB. MIT researchers have developed means to make the internet 100 times or even 1000 times faster.
According to Vincent Chan, an electrical engineering and computer science professor at MIT, replacing electrical signals inside the routers (that direct traffic on the internet) with faster optical signals will make the internet 100 times, if not 1000, times faster. This will also reduce the amount of energy it consumes and will make high speed data access a lot cheaper.
Usually routers convert incoming fiber-optic signals into electrical signals and store it in the memory till the time they are processed. The electrical signals are again converted back to optical signals so that they can be sent back. This is a lengthy and costly process that also eats up a lot of energy. So Chan and his team at MIT developed technology they call as flow switching that will eliminate all these conversions.
Many analysts are of the opinion that this could prove expensive to replace current routers, but again a speedier internet could be a huge achievement in the world of technology that can help industries flourish better.
