We transfer a song or a video to or pen drives, and watch it go at speeds of 5-6 mbps(USB 2.0). Now imagine something more than a thousand times faster. That is what we have from a collaborative project by the University of Stuttgart and Fraunhofer Institute for applied solid state physics IAF. The group of scientists successfully transmitted data at the rates of 6 Gbps via wireless excedding the earlier fastest be a factor of 10.
The collaborative project ACCESS (Advanced E Band Satellite Link Studies) realised the record data transmission between Cologne and Wachtberg, two towns about 37 Km apart. Located in the 45-story Uni-Centre in Cologne and the site of the Space Observation Radar TIRA at the Fraunhofer Institute for High Frequency Physics and Radar Techniques FHR in Wachtberg, data transmission took place in the 71-76 GHz range in the E band. High powered
Through efficient transmitters and receivers, the high effective bandwidths are available only in this frequency range of millimetre waves. Only here can the enormous data rates be realised.
Another matter for consideration is the weakening of the signals over larger distances. Highly powerful transmission requires the amplifiers to be correspondingly efficient. The efficient transmitters and receivers in the form of fully monolithic microwave integrated wave circuits (MMICs) are the key to such high speed data transmission.
ACCESS was finished on 30 April  and is being continued in the follow-up project ELIPSE (E Band Link Platform and Test for Satellite Communication). The aim now is the next generation of communication Âsystems for faster connection of satellites. Another application also is the terrestrial fixed wireless links.
The transmission of high quantities of data by radio over large distances serves a number of important application areas: the next generation of satellite communication requires an ever-increasing data offload down to earth. Connectivity to rural areas and remote regions with fast Internet is also a possibility.
About 250 internet connections can be supplied with 24 Mbps ADSL. Terrestrial radio transmissions in E-band are suitable as a cost-effective replacement for deployment of optical fibre or as ad-hoc networks in the case of crises and catastrophe, and for connecting base stations in the backhaul of mobile communication systems.
Modern developments such as the Internet of Things and Industry 4.0 demand unprecedented data transfer speeds. The processing and transmission in cloud-based services is already taking the communication infrastructure to its limits. In satellite communication, the progress in earth observation and space research along with the plans for a planet-scale satellite network are leading to yet unsolved challenges for the communication infrastructure.
