ZTE Corp., one of China's leading telecommunications equipment providers, has announced that it has broken the previous world record for single-channel optical fiber transmission rate at 1Tb/s with a recorded single-channel rate of 10Tbit/s. The optical signals were successfully transmitted over a stretch of 640km standard single-mode fiber, and were presented on March 10th at the OFC/NFOEC 2011 conference, Los Angeles, CA, USA . The article was accepted as a "post deadline paper"

The experiment used ZTE's patented "carrier generation technology" to generate 112 coherent and frequency-locked optical sub-carriers; with each sub-carrier bearing 100Gbit/s optical signals, and successfully realized optical signals with a single-channel rate of 11.2 Tbit/s, a net 10Tb/s line rate plus overheads such as FEC.

In an era where the global optical communications industry is entering 100G, all mainstream manufacturers are not only promoting the practical deployment of 100G but also actively seeking candidate technologies at higher bit rates of 400G, 1T, and beyond. With rapid growth in demand for higher bandwidth, single channel 10Tb/s will be the transmission rate for future telecommunication networks. ZTE has demonstrated the feasibility of 10Tbit/s single channel transmission over 640km using OFDM technology, opening a new chapter for future research in optical network technology.

Over the years, ZTE has invested in bearer optical network transmission technology; developing 100G model equipment and ULH transmission products, based on 100G product deployment, as well as being engaged in the research of beyond-100G high-speed signal transmission technology.