Teleportation Gets a Boost 405
saavyone writes to tell us Yahoo! News is reporting that while teleportation may not quite be a reality yet a team of Danish scientists have raised the bar on this line of research. From the article: "The experiment involved for the first time a macroscopic atomic object containing thousands of billions of atoms. They also teleported the information a distance of half a meter but believe it can be extended further. 'Teleportation between two single atoms had been done two years ago by two teams but this was done at a distance of a fraction of a millimeter,' Polzik, of the Danish National Research Foundation Center for Quantum Optics, explained. 'Our method allows teleportation to be taken over longer distances because it involves light as the carrier of entanglement,' he added."
Please... (Score:3)
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
It's still isn't anywhere near dematerializing the matter and poof`ing it across the room/planet. However, what is happening is the quantum information (in this case, the spin state) of the matter has been instantly transported. That is a essential step in building a quantum computer or cryptography network.
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however, if we are speaking about teleporting something bigger, it may turn out that we only need to copy the non-quantum information about the particles, which would actually make it duplication more than teleportation.
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If you can't measure it in the first place (and the original gets destroyed in the process), how do you know that what you end up with is a copy ?
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One-time pad encryption has been mathematically proven to be unbreakable. It also takes little computing power.
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So, if I can transmit information in such a way as to make one group of particles be in exactly the same quantum state as another group of particles, I have "teleport
Re:Please... (Score:5, Interesting)
In taking the next step, Eugene Polzik and his colleagues at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen shined a strong laser beam onto a cloud of room-temperature cesium atoms whose spins were all pointing in the same direction and fluctuating according to their given quantum state. The laser became entangled with the collective spin of the cloud, meaning that the quantum states of laser and gas shared the same amplitude but had opposite phases. The goal was to transfer, or teleport, the quantum state of a second light beam onto the cloud.
To do so, the group mixed a second, weaker laser pulse with the strong laser and split the superimposed beams into two arms. A detector in one arm measured the sum of the beams' amplitudes and a detector in the second arm measured the difference between their phases. Neither measurement disturbed the delicate entangled state between the light and cesium. But the researchers could use the results to apply a precise magnetic field to the cesium vapor that effectively canceled out the ensemble's original spin state and replaced it with one that corresponded to the polarization of the weak pulse, as they report in the 5 October Nature.
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Please... (Score:5, Funny)
KFG
Re:Please... (Score:5, Funny)
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Although the article isn't a "teleportation" article, it does provide a fairly in-depth explanation of the principle and implications of entanglement. The article then takes this one step further by suggesting that if the two paths that the entangled photons took were then themselves split, but splitting the second path an ad
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Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Please... (Score:5, Funny)
Its not a:
$ mv source target
Its a:
$ cp source target
Oh Gosh, now I fully know quantum computing!
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
$ mv source target
Because of the No cloning theorem(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_cloning_t
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$ cp source target ; rm -rf source
(actually, I think mv does exactly this, but just to be explicit
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a
b
a
Though whether a is actually preserved or just mangled I'm not sure of from the earlier description.
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10101011010110100101011100011110000000000110101
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Then the ME at Site A gets destroyed or reassembled as someone/something else.
Lets face it, this is what we all want this to come down to. Walk in a room that essentially becomes somewhere near the Swiss alps for lunch and walk back to be home for dinner. Telecommute anywhere.
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The "you" at site A will enter an undefined quantum state, and then (simultaneously, less the transit-time between the points at the speed of light) the block of mass at site B will become "you".
IE, the process is:
An atom of "you" exists at Site A, and an atom of "misc. matter" exists at Site B.
The atom of you is entangled - it stops being an atom of "you" and becomes an atom in an undefined quantum state.
The "you-ness" of the atom is sent to Site B at the speed of light, where it subsequently mer
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Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
$ cp source target ; rm -rf source :-) )
(actually, I think mv does exactly this, but just to be explicit
And nobody has corrected this yet? Is this really Slashdot?
The "cp" operation will temporarily consume twice as much space as the original before the original is removed. Actual data is being replicated. "mv" (at least within the same file system) will leave the data where it is and merely change where the pointer (i.e. directory entry) that points to it is stored. With your version you have two files temporarily and a possible duplication if the operation fails due to a power outage somewhere in the middle. The normal "mv" operation could leave you with NO files (the data is still there but unaccessible) depending on how it's implemented. (No, not on journalling file systems, but thats something else again).
In particular, a "cp ; rm" will delete your original if the cp fails due to, say, a full destination disk. So at least a "cp && rm" is advised. Which can fail, for example, if some of your source data is unreadable. While "mv" will still work, since the source data is never actually touched. Depending on your filesystem, default flags and implementation, "mv" will often also not change the last-access or creation-timestamps, file ownership and/or file permissions which may or may not be changed by cp. Also the permissions needed in the source and destination directories can be different for the two.
Really - what's up with you folks out there? Why aren't there 20 posts pointing this out already?
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@echo off
cls
echo.
echo Now teleporting...
move
REM sleep 30s (OMG! It's taking long this time! IT'S WOKRING!!!):
PING -n 31 127.0.0.1>nul
echo.
echo Done!
^Z
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# mv source target
everyone knows you have to be root to teleport SHEESH.
Re:Please... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Please... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think most people's concept of "teleport" is something else entirely. What the physicists are doing is something more aking to "faxing". Granted, it's really high-quality faxing, but faxing none the less. But "quantum faxing" doesn't have the same ring to it.
Fundamental to the concept of "teleport" as all non-physicists know it is that the matter being teleported moves from one place to another. In this case they "teleported" atoms of Cesium. But they started with Cesium atoms on both sides of the "teleporter" at the beginning and the end. They didn't "teleport" the Cesium any more than a FAX machine "teleports" paper.
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When Captain Kirk gets beamed down to the surface of a planet, where does all that matter come from which constitutes his body in the new location? There is no transporter on the receiving end with a stockpile of matter. How big of a vacuum would it leave behind if you just sucked up surrounding gas until you had enough? Put another way, if you tell somebody you a
Re:Please... (Score:5, Informative)
Put simply you can record the quantum states of an atom/particle(or your entire body) and then send this information using a classical channel like radio. Once this information gets to your destination(eg Mars) the guys at that end can use that information to affect some particles over there, and because of Quantum Entanglement, those particles on Mars will instantly take on the recorded state. The particles at the start will then lose their state due to the no cloning therom(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_cloning_th
Note that it's not technically "Teleportation", you are just changing the states at the quantum level.
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I liked the explanation, but this seems great for non-burning objects. What about fire? I mean, you can 'teleport' a log or a charcoal briquette, but will the fire go with it and will the fire retain flames or will it be a exact copy of a log but no '
Re:Please... (Score:4, Insightful)
2: Your stuff about the balance of matter and energy is something you made up (unless you can cite me a reference) and has no bearing on reality.
Please don't confuse the contents of your head with either science or reality. It's stupid.
Please explain (Score:4, Insightful)
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Mystical, no. But I'd say mysterious (Score:3, Insightful)
Very funny Scotty, (Score:5, Funny)
Anyone have the youtube link? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Anyone have the youtube link? (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.nbi.ku.dk/side39251.htm [nbi.ku.dk]
SciAm article (Score:5, Informative)
First Teleportation Between Light and Matter [sciam.com]
Re:SciAm article (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't know why people keep calling it "teleportation" or any other quantum crap. A very simple way of describing what happened is that they figured out a way to beat the uncertainty principle by creating multiple copies of the same information and measuring amplitude and phase of different copies. Because both copies are identical, any information obtained about one copy is valid about the others, so a complete set of parameters can be determined. It should be pointed out that this experiment clearly demonstrates that the uncertainty principle is not some fundamental property of the universe, but rather an artifact of our measurement instruments. This is the very point that Einstein tried so hard to prove back in 1927, and the one so throughly disputed by the evil Niels Bohr. Unfortunately, Bohr won the argument for some reason, perhaps just out of stubbornness, and the present unsightly state of the science of physics resulted. Perhaps now the quantum heretics can be brought back to the one true faith of objective reality!
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Einstein is always right, Niels Bohr is evil (?!) and your talking about one true faith of objective reality?
Are you ON somethin
Re:Scientific... American? (Score:5, Funny)
Ramifications (Score:5, Funny)
Dan East
But terrorists.....! (Score:2)
Just the information? (Score:2, Interesting)
But could you imagine if they could utilize a version of this teleportation to transfer the information to multiple places at once? Wow! That'd be a huge boon to subatomic construction technology!
Re:Just the information? (Score:5, Interesting)
If they're using quantum teleportation, they can't. It's not possible to clone generic quantum states. Specific ones, yes, but that won't cover everything.
The article is wonderfully sparse on actual information. A "macroscopic atomic object containing thousands of billions of atoms" was "involved," but what does that mean, exactly? Probably not that it was transformed to light (or light was transformed to it), nor that it was actually teleported.
My favorite part of quantum teleportation is that, if it ever is used to teleport objects, it'll have to transfer the state from the source atoms into some entangled destination atoms. Then the state will be lost in the source, and you'll be left with a mound of goo. That'd really make people want to try it out.
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Why would the teleported object melt into goo rather than simply vanishing in a de-atomized puff?
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The real question is why objects would disappear, not why they wouldn't. In the real world, everything has to go somewhere and the idea that you can tear something apart at the molecular level and send it somewhere in a "beam" is absurd.
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Not yet. Thirty years ago the whole idea of teleporting anything, even just spin states, was a preposterous proposition.
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It's not just preposterous, it's provably impossible. If someone manages to do it, it'd shake up all of quantum mechanics, which is one of the most well-tested theories there is.
Not that I'd shed a tear, mind you, because the replacement would be very exciting.
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That's why God invented mice!
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If you create a perfect atomic copy of a living being and then destroy the original, is the copy really the same as the original? What if you just never destroyed the original? Is destroying the original tantamount to murder?
I think questions like this will mean that even when we have the technology to do this with large objects (even living objects,) it will never be used on humans. The ethical risks, and our inability t
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Luckily, with this method of teleportation, we'll never have those types of questions. Instantaneously as the "copy" is created, the "original" ceases to exist by phsyical laws; there is no "...and _then_ destroy the original", because the original is gone. For all intents and purpos
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Yes. That's what the word "perfect" means. If you destroy the original, you just killed it.
Property rights would have to be split between the two. It would be like divorce court.
A person chosing to undergo such a transportation would be agreeing to having a copy of himself made, and transfering all his property rights to that person. H
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Correction:
if consciousness is something more than physical, then physically reconstructing the body might not be sufficient for teleportation anyway.
After all, if you don't know what the non-physical part is, you cannot tell how it would behave in a physical teleportation. After all, it might just attach to the reconstructed body, either immediatly or after some time.
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I really need to get one of these... (Score:4, Funny)
Thousands of billions... (Score:5, Funny)
Trillions, even?
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English-speaking world/Parts of Asia/One or two other places: 1 billion = 1000 millions = 1x10^9
"Rest of the world": 1 billion = 1 million millions = 1x10^12
Similarly, trillion will mean:
a) 1x10^12
b) 1x10^18
So, "thousands of billions" is the same as "trillions" in english-speaking countries, but not in the rest of the world. Since we're talking about danish scientists, I'm guessing it's the second option.
No, more than that (or less) (Score:3, Informative)
Given that they are in Europe, they are presumably using british English, where "thousands of billions" is the correct term for 10^15. So in American English, that would be Quadrillions.
Trillions, in British English, would be 10^18, but if he meant that he'd probalby have said so.
That American & British English spell various words differently is completely understandable, that we use the same words for totally different numbers is utterly ridiculous.
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10^6 million (million)
10^9 billion (thousand million)
10^12 trillion (billion)
10^15 quadrillion (thousand billion)
10^18 quintillion (trillion)
10^21 sextillion (thousand trillion)
10^24 septillion (quadrillion)
10^27 octillion (thousand quadrillion)
As per http://alt-usage-english.org/excerpts/fxbill00.htm l [alt-usage-english.org]
Macroscopic Atomic Object. (Score:2)
Isn't it just the quantum information that is... (Score:2)
Re:Isn't it just the quantum information that is.. (Score:2)
You have to transfer information from one document to another. If you look it, or measure in any way, the original - it is instantly destroyed.
This method allows you to transfer the information without measuring (i.e. destroying) it.
this just proves my theory... (Score:5, Funny)
You know... (Score:2, Insightful)
We all know what we expect from an article talking about teleportation, and it definitely doesn't involve crypted conversation technologies.
oblig (Score:2)
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No Thanks, I'll walk (Score:5, Funny)
I teleported home one night
With Ron and Sid and Meg;
Ron stole Meggie's heart away
And I got Sidney's leg.
Ok I will do it (Score:3, Insightful)
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It's an episode of TNG (Score:2)
In that episode, the "transport beam bounced off the atmosphere", leaving a copy behind.
OMG, I just realised why I am still here and single...
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How about the Iconians [startrek.com] from ST:TNG? Or how about the method that the terrorists used in "The High Ground [startrek.com]"?
Ok, that one was killing them with radiation poisoning. Maybe that's a bad example.
Anyway, wormholes: good. Molecular deconstruction/reassembly: bad.
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IIRC there is an older story by an older well-known SF author that Kelly's was similar to, but I can't remember the details now.
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Every other reply has missed the point entirely.
Teleporting with destroying the original is cloni
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There was a story about an extremely odd artifact found on the Moon that could only be explored by tele-copying somebody into it. It tended to kill you for doing all sorts of random things; for instance, writing the word "no" squished you instantly, and it was odd in various other ways. The author also postulated that the original, if kept in a sensory deprivation chamber, would briefly maintain contact, and thus the original could report on the experiences of the dead copy. Most
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As I understand it, this process starts with atoms at both locations and superimposes the quantum state of one onto the other. "Quantum faxing" would probably be a better metaphor than "teleportation".
Right... (Score:3, Insightful)
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The most obvious answer would be "it is physical".
This hypothesis can be tested. If I hit you in the head with a very large hammer at a very high velocity will you lose your soul? answer : yes.
This principle is widely accepted by society (in the realm of superstition and religion apparently consensus matters
Re:Ok I will do it (Score:5, Insightful)
One question worth asking, is whether the relative position of the atoms are maintained through "teleportation". I would assume not. So at this stage, even if you did succeed in transporting a human, they would end up as a pool of water and carbon atoms I guess.
This is more of a philosophical question, I think. Hypothetically speaking, you could see it as killing the person, and re-assembling their likeness. But "their likeness" would know no different, and he/she would feel and act like the real person. Equally, as you say, an outsider would know no different. Would you be willing to kill yourself, knowing that an exact replica of you is about to be re-created.
It goes further, too. Does the soul exist as something other than the collection of atoms and particles that comprise us? If so, does this get left behind, or somehow carried across?
[1] This is how I understand it, at least. Maybe someone could clarify, and explain if anything other than spin would get replicated.
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Numbers 6:6 literally states "do not touch a dead soul"
Genesis 2:7 "the man became a living soul"
Also Ge. 2:19 explains that as each animal or "living soul" would come to Adam he would name them. Ge. 1:20 the waters swarmed forth full of "liv
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Well if you believe in Quantum Immortality [wikipedia.org] then if the teloporation does kill your concioussness the teleporter will fail to work and if it doesn't then you are teleported along with your concioussness.
Of course I don't know what happens if you are teleported into a brick wall...
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They couldn't, because you are not the atoms "you" are made of. You are a collection of information in the state of the atoms.
Which is a good thing for you, because most of the atoms you are made of today won't be the same atoms you'll be made of next week. That's why you die if you don't drink some water now and again; and maybe a bit of a nosh.
KFG
Re:Ok I will do it (Score:5, Informative)
It isn't. Despite the regular press idiocy on this subject, quantum teleportation [wikipedia.org] has got absolutely nothing to do with Star Trek-style transporters. This is a form of communication link, teleporting information from one place to another at the speed of light. It cannot operate on people, rocks, or any other tangible object. We may someday invent a matter transporter, but it won't be using this technology and it certainly isn't what they're studying. To quote from the opening paragraph in the Wikipedia article, which is the very least any ignorant reporter should read before posting nonsense on the subject:
Quantum teleportation does not transport energy or matter, nor does it allow communication of information at superluminal speed.
This is about the next generation of technology that may someday replace optic fibre for long-distance communication links (and may also be useful in the construction of quantum computers, should we ever find a use for them). Nothing to do with Star Trek. If you ever catch a reporter confusing the two again, please hurt them. Badly.
You aren't even moving their particles. (Score:2)
All it is transferring the quantum state of one atom (spin etc) to that of another. So you aren't moving particles, you aren't transferring information about the relative arrangement of particles, or even what types of particles you are made of. If there were already two exact physical copies of your body you *might* be able to use an advanced version of this to sync up the quantum state of each corresponding atom, but even that is unlikely.
Easier method to teleport between solar systems (Score:4, Funny)
2. Use DNA sequence to grow said creature.
3. Install memory sequences, also sent as information.
4. Wake person up.
5. Keep original as slave in vast human slave army used to conquer the galaxy.
6. PROFIT!
Distance?? (Score:2, Informative)
Can someone explain teleportation (Score:2)
I understand that through quantum entanglement you can have make exact copy, by imparting one of the two photons onto other matte
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oh no (Score:2)
"raised the bar"? (Score:2, Funny)
Oblig ST... (Score:2)
This is so not teleportation (Score:2)
Suppose things were easy and we lived in a classical world. Then to teleport a particle from location A to B then all we'd have to do is send a message from A to B saying "there is particle of type X at position Y with momentum Z" and the person at the other end could go into a box, get one of the particles of type X out, and place it at a new position Y' (which is a suitable translate of Y) with momentum Z. Call this process 'C'.
The above is relatively easy. Now think
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Oh, you did mention "ducks..."
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Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to brush up on my crowbar skills.
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Why does no one make reference to the right movie [imdb.com]? Andre Delambre FTW. Seth can go fuck himself.