Take that Elon! Swiss researchers are developing ultra-fast satellite internet

Special lasers can transfer tens of terabits of data per second. An international research team led by Switzerland has demonstrated this in an experiment between the Jungfraujoch and Bern.

A new satellite internet should be created in the future, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETH Zurich) writes in a statement on Tuesday.

In the future, the technology will allow “creating backbone connections through near-Earth satellite constellations,” which will be significantly cheaper, according to the ETH.

Satellite internet in itself is nothing new. Elon Musk’s SpaceX Starlink satellites bring the internet to Ukraine. But that is based on a different technology. The Starlink satellites transmit data such as WLAN or mobile communication with wavelengths in the microwave range.

The new laser system, on the other hand, works in the near-infrared range, with wavelengths about 10,000 times shorter. This enables much faster data transfer.

However, the researchers did not test their laser system with a satellite in space, but via a transmission between the high-alpine research station on the Jungfraujoch and the Zimmerwald Observatory of the University of Bern.

However, this 53-kilometer route is much more demanding for data transmission than the route between a satellite and Earthsaid ETH Zurich. Because the atmosphere near the ground is much denser and full of turbulence.

The researchers will publish the results of the experiment on Tuesday in the scientific journal ‘Light: Science & Applications’. Industrial partners should now convert it into a salable product. “Our system represents a breakthrough,” said study leader Jürg Leuthold in the statement.

(dsc/sda)