Scientists Transfer Info Between Atoms (Star Trek Teleportation is REAL!)

Local 6 News ^ | 6-16-2004 | AP

[vannrox]

TED: 2:55 pm EDT June 16, 2004
UPDATED: 3:03 pm EDT 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.

[Arthalion]

Well, they know that it does it; they still don't know how it does it

Gah, philotes!

[Feiny]

firesigntheatre.com

[techcor]

Thanks.

[sharpblue]

Yes, of course. Consider an instantaneous transmission. If the receiver is moving away from the transmitter then in the receiver's frame the reception will take place earlier than the transmission. If the receiver is moving towards the transmitter then in the receiver's frame the reception will take place after the reception. In both cases, the signal will be received no later than it's transmitted in the transmitter's frame. You can see this by considering how the receiver would stack up simultaneity surfaces (not axes!) that, in the frame of the transmitter, tilt in opposite directions in the two cases.

The situation with superluminal but not instantaneous messages is a bit messier to think about and describe, which is why I chose the simple case of an instantaneous transmission in my article. If you look at my diagram of a Lorentz transformation

you should be able to convince yourself that for any given subluminal receiver there will be some speeds of FTL communication that will appear to be future-directed and others that will appear past-directed. For example, a transmission from Q to P will appear to be past-directed to an observer in the blue frame, whereas one from P to an event in the vicinity of the blue "space'" label will be future-directed. Note that the second transmission is slower than the first one, even thought both are faster than light.

(I realised while writing this that I haven't read the earlier messages in the thread, so I'm sorry if the discussion solely concerns spacecraft moving away from Earth.)

[sharpblue]

Well, I keep a close watch on my referrer log! Thanks for the welcome.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Just heard of this yesterday. If it is like quantum entanglement as it applies to photons, it is instantaneous at any distance.

That would rule! No more delayed communications! Instant contact between starbases!

[PatrickHenry]

From Physicist:
Psst: if the interlocutors are travelling towards each other, the time axis reaches into the future. By that statement I mean the spaceship's axis of simultaneity reaches into the Earth's future.

From sharplue:
I realised while writing this that I haven't read the earlier messages in the thread, so I'm sorry if the discussion solely concerns spacecraft moving away from Earth.

Traveling away from the earth was the content of the examples given, yes. And I confess it's the only situation I'd given any thought to. When, years ago, I realized the paradoxes involved, I pretty much abandoned any additional thinking about FTL communications. Now I'll re-examine the matter. It's always good to correct one's thinking.

[PatrickHenry]

Darn nice website!

[RightWhale]

Or, as a poster above mentioned, the delay even between Mars and earth could be eliminated. Immediate and practical applications are ready when the techs get some hardware working.

[Buggman]

If I remember correctly, time actually slows down as you approach c (speed of light in a vacuum). I believe that was one of the implications of special relativity. There's a reasonably simply equation for calculating it, which I toyed with during high school physics while everyone else was trying to figure out what the heck an electron was.

You remember correctly. As I recall, and as I was trying to explain earlier, the equation basically comes down to: Time will be distorted in such a way that light appears to be moving at the same speed regardless of the velocities of the vantage points in question. I've played around with it myself off-and-on for years since I first read Carl Sagan.

[longshadow]

obligatory FTL Limerick-like placemarker:

"There once was a man named Dwight
who could travel faster than light.
He went one day
in a 'relative' way,
and came back the previous night!"

[Physicist]

There once was a fencer named Fiske
Whose thrust was exceedingly brisk
So quick was his action
Fitzgerald contraction
Reduced his rapier to a disc!

[Doc On The Bay]

'Best I can Figure Out, ALL OF LIFE--& ALL LIVING ENTITIES,--are Patterns of Information imposed on an organic Physical Matrix.

If we can Recreate the "Matrix,"--& Transport the "Information," (& "Mate" the "Info" to the Physical Matrix) We have a "TRANSPORTER!!"

Certainly, the "Concept" is worthy of Furthur Study.

WHAT FUN, if It's Possible!!!!!!

Doc

[Junior]

And matter is just vortexes within the ether...

[Doc On The Bay]

...and matter is just vortexes in the ether...

--a Little Too Glib for my Taste; I Suspect we are a few Decades away from understanding the "Info/Matter Interface" well enough to manufacture a real "Transporter."

But, It MIGHT be Possible!!

Doc

[PatrickHenry]

Barney was Frank's fraternal twin,
You've heard of these paradoxical kin,
Barney stayed home,
While the stars Frank did roam,
To return younger than he ought to have been.

[RightWingAtheist]

Have you ever heard the classic 'The Wreck of The Lorentz Fitzgerald' by Gordon FTLightfoot?

[longshadow]

Have you ever heard the classic 'The Wreck of The Lorentz Fitzgerald' by Gordon FTLightfoot?

Can't say as I have, but it sure sounds apropo for this thread!

[Doctor Stochastic]

Have you ever heard the classic 'The Wreck of The Lorentz Fitzgerald' by Gordon FTLightfoot?

The focsle was contracted by truncation?

[PatrickHenry]

I'm revising my last line (it's my creation, so I can do what I want):

Barney was Frank's fraternal twin,
You've heard of these paradoxical kin,
Barney stayed home,
While the stars Frank did roam,
To return younger than he ought to have been.
Returning younger than he'd otherwise have been.