A quantum internet will be much faster and safer than the internet systems you are using right now. And now, the foundation of such a network may have taken a step closer to reality. Recently, scientists have used quantum teleportation to send information over a long distance with unprecedented fidelity.
Scientifically, it is based on a phenomenon called quantum entanglement, or quantum entanglement. It is a strange phenomenon that sounds like science fiction, but it exists in quantum mechanics. Essentially, two or more particles can be so tightly intertwined that changing the state of one particle will instantly change the state of its partner particles—no matter how far apart they are.
This mechanism—what Einstein referred to as “spooky action at a distance”—can be harnessed to create quantum networks. Pairs of photons can be entangled and separated, allowing data to be “teleported” between them over long distances. One consequence of this is the creation of a more secure network. Because anyone trying to intercept the data stream would not be able to eavesdrop, as any attempt to observe the quantum system would change that quantum system, and any changes in quantum state due to unauthorized reading would be detected immediately.
Recently, researchers at Fermilab, AT&T, Caltech, Harvard, NASA JPL, and the University of Calgary demonstrated the ability to sustainably and accurately teleport quantum information over a long distance. The team transmitted information over a distance of 44 km with a fidelity of over 90%, setting a new record for this distance.
To achieve this, the team added a third “node” in between the sender and receiver. To get information from A to B, both sides first send a photon to C. The receiver B will send a part of a quantum entangled pair and keep the other half. When the photons from A and B meet at C, they become entangled, thus transmitting information from A’s photon to both of B’s photons—the photon it sent and the photon it kept—thanks to the quantum entanglement link. Essentially, it is like teleporting information from A to B.
This is not the farthest distance that quantum teleportation has achieved. In 2015, information was teleported over fiber optics over a distance of more than 100 km, and in 2017, Chinese scientists broke the record by teleporting data over a distance of 1,200 km using a satellite as an intermediary.
However, compared to recent experiments, the results of the latest experiment marked a breakthrough in accuracy over long distances at 90%. For example, the 100 km record had an accuracy of about 80%, while the 1,200 km record had an accuracy of approximately 0.869 ± 0.085. The research team also stated that the experimental setup primarily consisted of existing components, which means that a future quantum internet could be built using the existing infrastructure.
The research has been published in the journal PRX Quantum.
Source: newatlas