Scientists Transfer Info Between Atoms

[Micaelis Rex]

Scientists Transfer Information Between Atoms in Step Toward More Powerful Computers

The Associated Press

June 16, 2004 — In a step toward making ultra-powerful computers, scientists have transferred physical characteristics between atoms by using a phenomenon so bizarre that even Albert Einstein called it spooky.
Such "quantum teleportation" of characteristics had been demonstrated before between beams of light.

The work with atoms is "a landmark advance," H.J. Kimble of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, Calif., and S.J. van Enk of Bell Labs in Murray Hill, N.J., declare in Thursday's issue of the journal Nature.

Two teams of scientists report similar results in that issue. One group was led by David J. Wineland of the National Institute of Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colo., and the other by Rainer Blatt of the University of Innsbruck in Austria.

Teleportation between atoms could someday lie at the heart of powerful quantum computers, which are probably at least a decade away from development, Wineland said. Although his work moved information about atomic characteristics only a tiny fraction of an inch, that's in the ballpark for what would be needed inside a computer, he said.

His work involved transmitting characteristics between pairs of beryllium atoms, while the Austrian work used pairs of calcium atoms. Each atom's "quantum state," a complex combination of traits, was transmitted to its counterpart.

Key to the process was a phenomenon called entanglement, which Einstein derided as "spooky action at a distance" before experiments showed it was real.

Basically, researchers can use lab techniques to create a weird relationship between pairs of tiny particles. After that, the fate of one particle instantly affects the other; if one particle is made to take on a certain set of properties, the other immediately takes on identical or opposite properties, no matter how far away it is and without any apparent physical connection to the first particle.

Just think of the implications of being able to change matter so easily! Beam me up Scotty comes to mind, but seriously, you'd be able to instantly transport anything anywhere - quite possibly faster than the speed of light. Who knows, maybe we are beginning to breach another dimension of set of dimensions. The day of sci-fi lovers like me is getting closer - the force is upon us.

 

[BassDude726]

Just think of the implications of being able to change matter so easily! Beam me up Scotty comes to mind, but seriously, you'd be able to instantly transport anything anywhere - quite possibly faster than the speed of light.

Can't you already do that with railroads?

 

[betazed]

fascinating.

Just think of the implications of being able to change matter so easily! Beam me up Scotty comes to mind, but seriously, you'd be able to instantly transport anything anywhere - quite possibly faster than the speed of light. Who knows, maybe we are beginning to breach another dimension of set of dimensions. The day of sci-fi lovers like me is getting closer - the force is upon us.

But if you are waiting for teleportation of anything more than atoms then don't hold your breath.

The transporter violates more laws of physics than any other device in Star Trek. If you are interested you can read the popular science book The Physics of Star Trek. It is a great read.

 

[CivCube]

It doesn't sound like this is Star Trek teleportation. If this method were to be used, the teleported person would be dead because the transported result would merely be the location's matter adjusted to fit the person's characteristics.

 

[Perfection]

Wow, this is most impressive, the entanglement tranfer of atoms is much than just single particles done before. I must say this is completly awesome.

Of course, the computer is still a long way off.

 

[Flak]

It doesn't sound like this is Star Trek teleportation. If this method were to be used, the teleported person would be dead because the transported result would merely be the location's matter adjusted to fit the person's characteristics.

No I don't think so, although I don't now how far the scientists have thought this out (probably pretty darn far. They've got vivid imaginations).

If you can create this quantum entaglement relationship between, let's say, the air on a transporter pad on a ship in orbit and a human being down on the surface of a planet, you could teleport all of the quantum/atomic properties of their body to the air on the pad. Simultaneously, the body left behind assumes the same properties of the air on the transporter pad. They just trade places. Transport complete!

 

[Sims2789]

So, what did they do exactly? Did they give the traits of one type of atom to another, or did they teleport them like in Star Trek? This article is very unclear.

 

[Bozo Erectus]

I agree with Dr. McCoy. I wouldnt use a transporter. Nobody is going to scramble my atoms and reassemble them, thanks very much.

 

[betazed]

So, what did they do exactly? Did they give the traits of one type of atom to another, or did they teleport them like in Star Trek? This article is very unclear.

What they did was take one set of particles quantum state - which means there spin orientation, net charge etc - and transferred it to another set of particles without bringing the particles into contact ever. Since the quantum state is everything that "defines" a particle you can say for all practical purposes the particle went from here to there without being anywhere in between. hence teleported.

 

[King Alexander]

Good to hear that. Just think in how many applications we could could use this scientific advance.

 

[FearlessLeader2]

Uh, actually, nothing moved anywhere. Quantum entanglement is something that could be used for communication, but I do not believe one could ever use it for transportation of objects. The atoms to be affected must be in fairly close proximity when they are synched.

If it is possible to have them retain their synchronization when seperated, then one could be put on a spacecraft, and two quatnum entangling radios could be used to conduct FTL communication between earth and the spacecraft.

If that is not possible, then the only use for this technology would be for quantum computers, which would of course, be a . . . quantum leap above modern super-computers. Basically, instead of passing the 1s and 0s as electircal signals across a silicon chip, they would be passed as charactersitics of one atom to another. This would dramatically reduce the size and heat generation of a given amount of processor power, making enormously powerful processors possible without costly super-conducting components or other esoteric and rare materials.

Superconductors make existing styles of supercomputers faster by reducing heat from resistance in circuits. They require costly cryogenic componenets to supercool them to the temperatures where they attain their superconductive properties. Room-temperature superconductors would further reduce the size and cost of these computers, making more powerful versions of them possible.

Room-temperature superconductors made of economically feasible materials would dramatically revolution the power transmission industry as well. Power lines lose electricity to heat due to minute resistance in wires. Superconductors would eliminate the heat loss, making power transmission more efficient.

Combine superconductivity with quantum entanglement, and you've got a vastly more powerful processor that takes up less space, uses less power, and performs feats of calculation undreamt of. Hand-held scanners that can count the number of molecules in Leonard Nimoy's butt, for instance.

 

[CurtSibling]

Funny how so many scorn progress.

Shall we revert to horse and cart then?

 

[Plotinus]

This isn't really teleportation. I might be happy to have my atoms mixed up and transported somewhere else to be reassembled. But I would not be happy to step into a machine that annihilates me and creates a perfect replica somewhere else, even if that replica thinks it's me.

 

[Sparta]

I'm late for work already, so I can't elaborate, but I had watched a discussion of the potentials of entanglement once, and they also mentioned encryption as as a possible benefit. Obviously, quantum computers would rule (I'd heard that silicon tech will basically peak around 2017, at least according to a computer engineering professor at UW-Madison I had (and regardless, the potential of quantum computing dwarfs the ability of traditional silicon-based computing, as in easily beats a silicon computer utilizing every single particle in the universe). However, they also extolled the potential of using entanglement as the ultimate encryption device at some length. Theoretically, if you could use the two entangled particles as an unbreakable lock and key, there would never be a need for fallible encryption algorithms again. So who knows - we may wind up with entangled-particle ATM cards in a few decades...

 

[Perfection]

If it is possible to have them retain their synchronization when seperated, then one could be put on a spacecraft, and two quatnum entangling radios could be used to conduct FTL communication between earth and the spacecraft.

This is incorrect. No communication can occur, if one entangled atom is manipulated to send a signal the quantum entanglement is destroyed. Addtionally you can't use it to make a signal in its norrmal state becuase all either side gets is random signals, they are the same on both sides, but they cannot compare them to see if they are that way by FTL means.

 

[cgannon64]

What they did was take one set of particles quantum state - which means there spin orientation, net charge etc - and transferred it to another set of particles without bringing the particles into contact ever. Since the quantum state is everything that "defines" a particle you can say for all practical purposes the particle went from here to there without being anywhere in between. hence teleported.

So that's not really teleporting, more like reprogramming an atom to be like another one?

Interesting.

So, if it ever got to teleportation like Star Trek, we wouldn't be beamed, just take over the body of someoen else??