Physicist trying to send a signal back in time

phil reed writes: University of Washington physicist John Cramer is attempting to send a signal back through time.

"We're going to shoot an ultraviolet laser into a (special type of) crystal, and out will come two lower-energy photons that are entangled," Cramer said. For the first phase of the experiment, to be started early next year , they will look for evidence of signaling between the entangled photons. Finding that would, by itself, represent a stunning achievement. Ultimately, the UW scientists hope to test for retrocausality — evidence of a signal sent between photons backward in time.

The test will involve sending one of the photons down 10 miles of fiber optic cable, delaying it by 50 microseconds, then testing a quantum-mechanical aspect of the delayed photon. Due to quantum entanglement, the non-delayed photon would need to reflect the measurement made 50 microseconds later on the delayed photon. In order for this to happen, some kind of signal would need to be sent 50 microseconds back in time from the delayed photon to the non-delayed photon. (Confusing? Quantum physics is like that.)