Clemson collaborates on project that could make the internet faster and more secure.

Clemson University is collaborating on a $20-million project that could make the internet faster and more secure. Researchers say the project could open the door to a host of new services that haven't yet been imagined, including some in artificial intelligence and virtual reality.

Researchers will build a network they are calling Fabric to test new "internet architectures" the technical and organizational structure of the internet, according to a news release.

The internet, first designed in the 1960s, has become central to daily life in the modern world, changing everything from how consumers get their news to how they shop for shoes. But the Fabric research will go beyond how most consumers currently use the internet, the news release said.

It could fundamentally change how applications are developed and create opportunities for a wide range of new innovations, such as connecting all the cars in a city so they can communicate with each other, said Kuang-Ching "K.C." Wang, a co-principal investigator on Fabric and professor of electrical and computer engineering at Clemson.

"We want to do all we can to make the system such that researchers or application developers can start to think about the network differently," Wang said in the news release. "They will feel like there is much more flexibility in where they want to develop their software. It's not just on their computer and then they send out some information. Rather, from the very beginning, they will be able to think, 'What if the whole internet is a computer?' How would you want to develop your application if that were the case?"

Scientific researchers will be the first to use...