Fiber Optic Cable — Questions and answers
What did Dr. Charles K. Kao imagine information flowing as, instead of electricity?
Answer: Light
According to George Hockham, what was a big problem with copper wires when trying to carry a lot of information?
Answer: Signal strength dropped and crosstalk happened
What did Charles K. Kao and George Hockham believe was the reason glass lost too much light, instead of the glass material itself?
Answer: It had tiny impurities
What was the special number of decibels per kilometer (dB/km) that Kao and Hockham said glass needed to reach to be useful for long-distance communication?
Answer: Less than 20 dB/km
What kind of impurities did ordinary glass contain that absorbed light, making it difficult to use for fiber optics?
Answer: Iron and copper ions
What was the name of the company that successfully created the first optical fiber with very low signal loss in 1970?
Answer: Corning Glass Works
What was one big advantage fiber optic cables had over copper wires in the mid-1970s?
Answer: They were immune to electromagnetic interference
What was the name of the first transatlantic fiber optic cable, laid in 1988?
Answer: TAT-8
Which of these is NOT mentioned as something fiber optic cables help us do today?
Answer: Drive cars