Described by its inventors as "simple and effective," the new technique relies on three antennas, instead of the two found in . It allows full-duplex communications on the same frequency (that is, simultaneous send and receive), something considered before now to be physically impossible.

The radio spectrum is and boosting speeds without requiring additional frequencies is the Holy Grail of electrical engineering.

When a radio device transmits, its broadcasts are too strong for it to receive any signals. It's like two people conversing; if you're speaking, it's impossible to hear what another is saying. Both parties must take turns to speak, and generally speaking this is how radio transmissions have worked until now.

The trick behind doubling speeds is to use something akin to . Because the transmitting device knows exactly what it's sending, it can filter it out in order to hear weaker incoming transmissions. Thus, two-way communications on the same frequency can take place.

"Textbooks say you can't do it," says Philip Levis, one of the team behind the invention and assistant professor of computer science and electrical engineering at Stanford. "The new system completely reworks our assumptions about how wireless networks can be designed."