A Milestone Achieved In Teleportation [Quantum Computing]

We've still got a long way to go before human beings can be beamed from one place to another Star Trek-style, but on Friday a team of scientists at the University of Maryland achieved, nonetheless, a milestone in teleportation.

According to LiveScience, the university's Joint Quantum Institute for the first time was able to teleport information between two separate atoms across a distance of a meter--about one step for an adult.

Generally, teleportation works thanks to a remarkable quantum phenomenon called entanglement that only occurs on the atomic and subatomic scale. Once two objects are put in an entangled state, their properties are inextricably entwined. In layman's terms, if they are in entangled mode, what you "see" on one is what you get on the other.

The JQI team set out to entangle the quantum states of two individual ytterbium ions so information embodied in one could be teleported to the other. Each ion was isolated in a separate high-vacuum trap, suspended in an invisible cage of electromagnetic fields and surrounded by metal electrodes.

After that, the experiment worked like this: Single photons from each of two icons in separate traps interacted at a beamsplitter. When both detectors recorded a photon simultaneously, the icons were entangled. At that point, ion A was measured, revealing exactly what operation had to be performed on ion B to teleport ion A's information.
Theoretically, quantum computers would be much better than classical computers at sorting through huge databases to find the right information. One of the leading applications would be to find the prime factors of large numbers, which are the key to today's cryptographic systems.

A quantum computing system would be a godsend to spies - and that may be why the research reported in Science was supported by the federal government's Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity, or IARPA, as well as by the National Science Foundation.Contd ; http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-10150272-1.html?tag=mncol;title & http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20090123/sc_livescience/teleportationmilestoneachieved & http://www.geek.com/articles/news/scientists-reach-teleportation-milestone-20090126/

Last edited by techy on 27th January 2009, 11:20 am; edited 1 time in total

WOW! is this true?

Check out the links at the end of the post.

the system causes information from an atom to simply disappear and reappear at another atom.

that's quite scary if applied to humans don't you think? but it was just an atom so it was ok. But i hope it'll improve in time, like using only one atom and make it appear in another place?

But to think of something like that was really awesome!thnx for the information!

Cool stuff. I wonder if the CERN colliders comes in handy.

This is very interesting. I think the internet would have no downloading time.

AWERSOME POST..