This amazing performance was achieved at a conference, this November

Dec 13, 2011 13:59 GMT  ·  By

During the SuperComputing 2011 (SC11) conference, which was held in Seattle, Washington this mid-November, experts were able to use a wide-area network circuit to transfer data from one location to another at a combined rate of 186 gigabits per second (Gbps).

The international team that developed the new capability says that the innovation could be used to develop a new generation of high-speed networks, which could support data transfer rates that are currently inaccessible.

This transfer rate is the equivalent of moving 100,000 BluRay disks through a network every single day – around 2 million gigabytes. The team behind the work included experts at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), the University of Victoria, and the University of Michigan, among others.

“Having these tools in our hands allows us to engage in realizable visions others do not have. We can see a clear path to a future others cannot yet imagine with any confidence,” Caltech physics professor and team leader Harvey Newman explains.