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WHEN WE THINK OF digital communications, we tend to imagine data speeding invisibly through the air. But even in this era of ubiquitous wireless technology, our networks still rely heavily on physical connections: fiber optic wires traverse oceans and tie together continents.
The number of these undersea cables is increasing, and they play an important role in our high-tech society. Yet the undersea cable industry is largely unknown and suffers from a chronic labor shortage. Opportunities abound for engineers in many disciplines, but most dont know about the possibilities or where to get training.
A new curriculum at the University of California, Berkeley, is attempting to address both challenges. Housed in the Berkeley Center for New Media, the certificate program takes an interdisciplinary approach to global internet infrastructure, including the "technical, economic, legal, environmental, and social dimensions."
Nicole Starosielski, a UC Berkeley film and media professor, developed the program. She teaches classes and supervises projects on digital infrastructures in addition to conducting research on elements such as data centers and undersea cables. Over her decade in the industry, she has heard repeatedly about the labor challenges. "We need additional people," she says. "We need engineers in the industry. And there aren't any training programs at universities. So that motivated me to address the workforce gap"
Slim but Mighty
TeleGeography, a Washington, DC-based company specializing in telecommunications data and analysis, estimates that submarine cables account for about 99 percent of intercontinental data traffic. According to research analyst Lane Burdette, "these long, thin cables transmit data more cheaply and efficiently than satellites"
Submarine cables are a "critical but often forgotten part of global communications; Burdette says. As digital infrastructure becomes increasingly important to the world, UC Berkeley's webpage stresses, that invisibility places continuity of service at risk.
The history of subsea telecommunication cables stretches back to the early days of the telegraph. Since the installation of the world's first submarine cable in 1850, connecting France and England across the Dover Strait, these cables have been essential to the world's communications infrastructure.
Whereas cables once connected cities, they now link data centers. Today, some 900,000 miles of cables crisscross the earth's oceans as part of nearly 600 different systems, according to TeleGeography. Enabling millions of phone calls and...