Stable Quantum Teleportation: Breakthrough in Teleporting Information Between Gas Clouds

Quantum teleportation is nothing new. In fact, scientists have been able to teleport information from light to light at a quantum level for several years. Now, though, they've made a new breakthrough. Researchers have succeeded in teleporting information between two clouds of gas atoms--several times.

In order to actually conduct this experiment, the researchers used two glass containers filled with clouds of billions of caesium gas atoms. While these two containers did not connect to each other, information could be teleported between the two--from one gas cloud to the other--by means of laser light. The light was sent into the first glass container where the quantum phenomenon took place--the light and gas became entangled.

Quantum entanglement occurs when particles such as photons, electrons or molecules interact physically and then become separated. This type of interaction is such that each resulting member of the pair is properly described by the same quantum mechanical description. Essentially, when something happens to one particle, the same happens to the other paired particle--despite their separation.

Both of the glass containers were enclosed in a chamber with a magnetic field and when the laser light hit the gas atoms, the outermost electrons in the atoms react--like magnetic needles--by pointing in the same direction. The direction can be up or down, and it's this direction that makes up quantum information. In fact, it's similar to the way regular computer information is made up of numbers 0 and 1.

After this occurred, the gas emitted photons containing quantum information. The light was sent on to the other gas container and the quantum information was read from the light and registered by a detector. The signal from the detector was sent back to the first container and the direction of the atoms' electrons were adjusted in relation to the signal.

"It is a very important step for quantum information research to have achieved such stable results that every attempt will succeed," said Eugene Polzik, head of the research center Quantop at the Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen, in a news release.

Currently, the teleportation's range is only about three feet, which is hardly impressive in a world where information must be transported across the globe in no time at all. Yet this range could potentially be increased if the researchers had the space. The fact that this particular experiment is so stable is an important step forward when it comes to building a quantum communication network in the future.

The findings are published in the journal Nature Physics.