Teleportation Gets a Boost 405
saavyone writes to tell us Yahoo! News is reporting that while teleportation may not quite be a reality yet a team of Danish scientists have raised the bar on this line of research. From the article: "The experiment involved for the first time a macroscopic atomic object containing thousands of billions of atoms. They also teleported the information a distance of half a meter but believe it can be extended further. 'Teleportation between two single atoms had been done two years ago by two teams but this was done at a distance of a fraction of a millimeter,' Polzik, of the Danish National Research Foundation Center for Quantum Optics, explained. 'Our method allows teleportation to be taken over longer distances because it involves light as the carrier of entanglement,' he added."
SciAm article (Score:5, Informative)
First Teleportation Between Light and Matter [sciam.com]
Re:Anyone have the youtube link? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.nbi.ku.dk/side39251.htm [nbi.ku.dk]
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
It's still isn't anywhere near dematerializing the matter and poof`ing it across the room/planet. However, what is happening is the quantum information (in this case, the spin state) of the matter has been instantly transported. That is a essential step in building a quantum computer or cryptography network.
Re:Please... (Score:2, Informative)
So, if I can transmit information in such a way as to make one group of particles be in exactly the same quantum state as another group of particles, I have "teleported" them in some sense.
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
Put simply you can record the quantum states of an atom/particle(or your entire body) and then send this information using a classical channel like radio. Once this information gets to your destination(eg Mars) the guys at that end can use that information to affect some particles over there, and because of Quantum Entanglement, those particles on Mars will instantly take on the recorded state. The particles at the start will then lose their state due to the no cloning therom(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_cloning_th
Note that it's not technically "Teleportation", you are just changing the states at the quantum level.
Distance?? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Thousands of billions... (Score:2, Informative)
English-speaking world/Parts of Asia/One or two other places: 1 billion = 1000 millions = 1x10^9
"Rest of the world": 1 billion = 1 million millions = 1x10^12
Similarly, trillion will mean:
a) 1x10^12
b) 1x10^18
So, "thousands of billions" is the same as "trillions" in english-speaking countries, but not in the rest of the world. Since we're talking about danish scientists, I'm guessing it's the second option.
Re:Thousands of billions... (Score:1, Informative)
American Billion = 10^9, trillion = 10^12
European Billion = 10^12, trillion = 10^18
No, more than that (or less) (Score:3, Informative)
Given that they are in Europe, they are presumably using british English, where "thousands of billions" is the correct term for 10^15. So in American English, that would be Quadrillions.
Trillions, in British English, would be 10^18, but if he meant that he'd probalby have said so.
That American & British English spell various words differently is completely understandable, that we use the same words for totally different numbers is utterly ridiculous.
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
$ mv source target
Because of the No cloning theorem(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_cloning_t
Re:Thousands of billions... (Score:2, Informative)
10^6 million (million)
10^9 billion (thousand million)
10^12 trillion (billion)
10^15 quadrillion (thousand billion)
10^18 quintillion (trillion)
10^21 sextillion (thousand trillion)
10^24 septillion (quadrillion)
10^27 octillion (thousand quadrillion)
As per http://alt-usage-english.org/excerpts/fxbill00.ht
Re:Ok I will do it (Score:5, Informative)
It isn't. Despite the regular press idiocy on this subject, quantum teleportation [wikipedia.org] has got absolutely nothing to do with Star Trek-style transporters. This is a form of communication link, teleporting information from one place to another at the speed of light. It cannot operate on people, rocks, or any other tangible object. We may someday invent a matter transporter, but it won't be using this technology and it certainly isn't what they're studying. To quote from the opening paragraph in the Wikipedia article, which is the very least any ignorant reporter should read before posting nonsense on the subject:
Quantum teleportation does not transport energy or matter, nor does it allow communication of information at superluminal speed.
This is about the next generation of technology that may someday replace optic fibre for long-distance communication links (and may also be useful in the construction of quantum computers, should we ever find a use for them). Nothing to do with Star Trek. If you ever catch a reporter confusing the two again, please hurt them. Badly.
Re:SciAm article (Score:3, Informative)
Einstein is always right, Niels Bohr is evil (?!) and your talking about one true faith of objective reality?
Are you ON something? Your Special K ain't the breakfast cereal?
Re:Please... (Score:3, Informative)
Then the ME at Site A gets destroyed or reassembled as someone/something else.
Lets face it, this is what we all want this to come down to. Walk in a room that essentially becomes somewhere near the Swiss alps for lunch and walk back to be home for dinner. Telecommute anywhere.
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
$ cp source target ; rm -rf source :-) )
(actually, I think mv does exactly this, but just to be explicit
And nobody has corrected this yet? Is this really Slashdot?
The "cp" operation will temporarily consume twice as much space as the original before the original is removed. Actual data is being replicated. "mv" (at least within the same file system) will leave the data where it is and merely change where the pointer (i.e. directory entry) that points to it is stored. With your version you have two files temporarily and a possible duplication if the operation fails due to a power outage somewhere in the middle. The normal "mv" operation could leave you with NO files (the data is still there but unaccessible) depending on how it's implemented. (No, not on journalling file systems, but thats something else again).
In particular, a "cp ; rm" will delete your original if the cp fails due to, say, a full destination disk. So at least a "cp && rm" is advised. Which can fail, for example, if some of your source data is unreadable. While "mv" will still work, since the source data is never actually touched. Depending on your filesystem, default flags and implementation, "mv" will often also not change the last-access or creation-timestamps, file ownership and/or file permissions which may or may not be changed by cp. Also the permissions needed in the source and destination directories can be different for the two.
Really - what's up with you folks out there? Why aren't there 20 posts pointing this out already?
Re:Thousands of billions... (Score:1, Informative)
Re:Please... (Score:3, Informative)
The "you" at site A will enter an undefined quantum state, and then (simultaneously, less the transit-time between the points at the speed of light) the block of mass at site B will become "you".
IE, the process is:
An atom of "you" exists at Site A, and an atom of "misc. matter" exists at Site B.
The atom of you is entangled - it stops being an atom of "you" and becomes an atom in an undefined quantum state.
The "you-ness" of the atom is sent to Site B at the speed of light, where it subsequently merges with an atom of "misc. matter", transferring its "you-ness" to the atom.
Therefore, excepting the transit-time (at the speed of light) each change happens instantaneously in one step. No two-step duplication-then-deletion occurs, as Quantum Mechanics forbids a distinct quantum state from ever being duplicated.
It's mv, not cp.