Plastic fibre offer 'last mile' alternative

gallery

The Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST) earlier this week said it has developed an optical fibre made of plastic that can, in theory, deliver 25 times quicker internet access over the 'last mile' between the user and the exchange.

The team responsible for the breakthrough claims to have succeeded in rigging a home network using the cabling after six years of research.

It said the plastic fibre achieved current transmission speeds of up 2.5GB per second in comparison to the older, copper equivalent, which carries just 100MB per second.

"All the materials and applications were developed by local researchers," the Institute stated. "The communication solution is also designed to work well with South Korea's uniquely dense housing environment and its 'fibre-to-the-home' infrastructure."

But the news of the development has been widely reported around the world, just as a recently published report predicted internet 'brownouts' unless global network infrastructure investment is ramped up by 60 to 70 per cent.

The announcement has sparked interest because of the potential of the South Korean development to offer a cheaper cabling alternative to glass optical fibre, which is used in the majority of network infrastructure implementations, with transmission speeds that are four times faster.

Although glass fibre can also cover long distances, installing it can be expensive as it is fragile, can break easily, is highly sensitive in enclosed environments and is difficult to physically connect together.

Plastic offers an intermediary solution between the speed of glass and the physical flexibility of glass, KIST said, capable of carrying 6,000 digital phone connections a second.

It also said its cable would offer superior performance and cost a third the price of similar technology also currently under development in Japan by cabling manufacturer, Asahi Glass.

But experts have questioned whether it is the logistical requirements of actually laying the cable that outweighs the savings and physical advantages of the South Korean plastic fibre.

Email to a friend

Print this page