For the first time, a submarine telecommunications cable will include an infrastructure for studying the conditions of the ocean floor. "Ella Link GeoLab" will offer Europe's scientific community updated data in real time.
EllaLink Group and EMACOM - Madeira Telecommunications announced today the creation of an infrastructure dedicated to sending real-time data on the conditions of the ocean floor - the "EllaLink Geo Lab". This information will be key to "understand the future of our planet", they emphasize, highlighting the applications of this data in areas such as seismology, volcanology, marine ecology, for example .
The presented infrastructure integrates, as basic technology, a distributed acoustic sensor that will use dedicated fiber of the Ella Link communication system, in the Madeira region. Thus, the sensor will collect data along the path of the submarine cable, which will then be transmitted to the coast, without any impact on telecommunications traffic or wear of equipment.
The European scientific community will thus have access to the data generated in the EllaLink Geo Lab. Given that this structure will be installed on the Portuguese continental shelf, the project has the collaboration of GÉANT and the National Scientific Computing Unit (FCCN ) of the Foundation for Science and Technology.
The member of the Board of Directors of the Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT), Nuno Feixa Rodrigues, highlights the "Ella Link GeoLab" as "much more than just a sophisticated scientific infrastructure". " It is a scientific challenge linked to various areas of knowledge," he emphasizes, stressing the FCT's commitment to "support and encourage the national and international scientific community to achieve this ambition.
For Ella Link Group CEO Philippe Dumont, the information gathered by this structure is essential to understanding "a time of constant environmental change", and there is essential information that can be gathered through ocean floor analysis. "We are proud to lead the way into a new era in which submarine cable systems support this scientific advance," he reinforced.
The Ella Link submarine cable will connect South America and Europe, with the entry points being installed in Sines and Fortaleza in Brazil. This structure is expected to become operational in the first four months of 2021. For more information, visit: https://ella.link/
