A Breakthrough for Speeding Satellite Feeds

Satellite companies see promise in new technology to double bandwidth.

An emerging data-coding technology could more than double bandwidth on satellite Internet connections, boosting service to developing countries, planes, and cruise ships—and fixing jerky, stop-and-start images from live video news feeds.

The work is described in a recent paper by researchers at MIT and its Lincoln Laboratory, together with colleagues at the Hamilton Institute in Maynooth, Ireland. They say that the gains could be as much as 20-fold in conditions where data losses are exceptionally large.

The advance could be most noticeable to television news watchers because it could end glitchy feeds from overseas correspondents. The satellite communications company Inmarsat plans to test the technology in 2014. “We are hoping it would give us clean video with fewer disruptions,” says Ammar Khan, whose title is design authority at the London-based company.

Read more: http://www.technologyreview.com/news/522831/a-breakthrough-for-speeding-satellite-feeds/