Packet Transport Technology Improves Wireless Bandwidth by 10x

David Talbot reports to MIT's Technology Review that "Academic researchers have improved wireless bandwidth by an order of magnitude .. by using algebra to banish the network-clogging task of resending dropped packets".

Prof. Muriel Medard (pictured), MIT's Research Laboratory of Electronics and a leader in the effort, says:  "Several companies have licensed the underlying technology in recent months, but the details are subject to nondisclosure agreements.. Elements of the technology were developed by researchers at MIT, the University of Porto in Portugal, Harvard University, Caltech, and Technical University of Munich. The licensing is being done through an MIT/Caltech startup called Code-On Technologies"

"The technology transforms the way packets of data are sent. Instead of sending packets, it sends algebraic equations that describe series of packets. So if a packet goes missing, instead of asking the network to resend it, the receiving device can solve for the missing one itself. Since the equations involved are simple and linear, the processing load on a phone, router, or base station is negligible"

"Testing the system on Wi-Fi networks at MIT, where 2 percent of packets are typically lost, Medard's group found that a normal bandwidth of one megabit per second was boosted to 16 megabits per second".

See also - "Google [Still] Claims there is a Faster TCP" - here and "Huawei Improves TCP Performance by up-to 50%" - here.

See "A Bandwidth Breakthrough" - here.