DARPA wants to build 100Gbps wireless military network
Defense researchers are looking to update the wireless platform currently used for military communications to deliver 100Gbps connections.
While fiber-optic cables provide the long-haul backbone for most data and voice communications networks without issue, radio signals often face electronic interference and degradation over long distances, resulting in reduced communications efficiency to soldiers in the field.
The current Common Data Link, the U.S. military's secure communications protocol created in 1991, operates at data rates of up to 274Mbps. To boost that speed, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is inviting input on creation of a new wireless communications platform that would match the weight and power of the current CDL.
DARPA has announced that a "proposer's day" will be held next month to brief participants on the 100G program, which aims "to design, build, and test a communications link with fiber-optic-equivalent capacity, long reach, and high availability in airborne-to-airborne and airborne-to-ground configurations that can serve as a deployable data backbone in a military communications network."
