Scientists Take Quantum Steps Toward Teleportation

[LaurenG]

(older article from August 1, 2010, but I hadn't seen it)

"Quantum entanglement" may sound like an awful sci-fi romance flick, but it's actually a phenomenon that physicists say may someday lead to the ability to teleport an object all the way across the galaxy instantly.

It's not exactly the Star Trek version of teleportation, where an object disappears then reappears somewhere else. Rather, it "entangles" two different atoms so that one atom inherits the properties of another.

"According to the quantum theory, everything vibrates," theoretical physicist Michio Kaku tells NPR's Guy Raz. Kaku is a frequent guest on the Science and Discovery channels. "When two electrons are placed close together, they vibrate in unison. When you separate them, that's when all the fireworks start."

This is where quantum entanglement — sometimes described as "teleportation" — begins. "An invisible umbilical cord emerges connecting these two electrons. And you can separate them by as much as a galaxy if you want. Then, if you vibrate one of them, somehow on the other end of the galaxy the other electron knows that its partner is being jiggled."

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128910996

[midnight]

1. Very cool idea...

[xxqqqzme]

3. I remember many years ago

getting caught up in ramblings on teleportation. We decided some people would decline w/ You'll never get me in one of those things'. You know the stoned conversations of 'wasted' youth.

[FiveGoodMen]

5. I teleported home one night

With Ron and Sid and Meg
Ron stole Meggie's heart away
And I got Sidney's leg

-- Douglas Adams

[enlightenment]

2. Yes, very cool!

But the 'one atom inherits the properties of another' sounds a lot like McCoy's criticism of the teleporter in Star Trek - mixing things up a bit much.

I hope they have great success with this line of research. Thank you for posting the link!

[MineralMan]

4. Kinda like identical twins, I guess.

They always seem to sense things, even if separated by long distances.

I used to date one twin of two. It worked out OK, until they tried to fool me once by swapping places. The joke turned out to be on them, though, because I knew the difference, but they didn't find my joke amusing, I guess. Oh, well.

[Orrex]

6. Sort of, except not a myth

:evilgrin:

[txlibdem]

7. This group was able to teleport information a distance of about 1 meter

But a Chinese group of researchers has already teleported information over a distance of 16km (10 miles). See these links for info:
http://www.dailytech.com/China+Teleports+Photons+10+Miles+Surpasses+USEuropean+Record/article18551.htm
http://news.discovery.com/tech/teleportation-quantum-mechanics.html

What grabs my attention is the phrase, "an invisible umbilical cord... connecting these two electrons. And you can separate them by as much as a galaxy if you want."

M-Theory says that there are actually 11 dimensions to our current space-time, not merely the 4 that we are familiar with (Width, Length, Depth, and Time). The idea strikes me that perhaps not all of these dimensions are the same size, perhaps not all of them underwent the expansion caused by the Big Bang. Perhaps there is one that is still the size of the primordial universe, which still maintains a point-for-point connection to our 3 dimensional universe, and which can act as the conduit for these quantum effects such as teleportation.

Carrying that out to its logical conclusion, one day we may be able to transport ourselves practically instantly to any location in the universe with equal ease as beaming ourselves from one town to the next.