Quantum 'teleportation' might be able to help us send data faster than ever before

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One of the most important questions is how to best transmit massive amounts of data over increasingly large distances. Now, quantum theorists believe that "teleportation," as previously imagined by Star Trek and Willy Wonka, could be the quantum key to truly lossless data transmission.

According to new research from the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and quantum workgroups at Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia, quantum data transfer could blow our minds. Their findings, which involve capturing and recovering stray photons during data transfers, have been published in Nature Communications.

We'll set the stage by imagining various data scenarios. Consider a simple telegraph set, in which one wire carries a signal that is sent one zap or quiet space at a time. As electrons are swapped on the molecular level, these zaps travel all the way back and forth. That is, at its most basic, what electricity is.

Consider a computer network in which files are transferred to and from a server or between different workstations. These files appear to move at breakneck speed, but in reality, different pieces are passed back and forth one at a time. The algorithms that manage it even have "collision detection" to ensure that less data is lost when pieces of the cables collide.

Both of these scenarios involve the transmission of data. They appear to be very different in terms of complexity, but they both represent a simple paradigm: continuous flow. Data pours in one direction or the other in these situations, much like water from a pitcher. It alternates at times, but the flow through the pipes remains constant.

Here's the thing about continuous or linear information flow: there is loss. Even in computer networks, data packets can collide, drop, and become lost. In a large local fiber-optic network, for example, light bounces around inside the fiber, with some inevitable loss due to the nature of light itself. "Loss-induced noise, such as that caused by scattering and diffraction," the researchers write, "is unavoidable in long-distance information transfer."

Even in cutting-edge data transfer, such as massive fiber optic trunks connecting entire cities or countries, bouncing light particles power the entire technology. These technologies emit photons, so finding ways to reduce loss is a huge industry in and of itself. The more data we send, the more small losses add up to large amounts of data lost.

To investigate the loss, the scientists first conducted an experiment in which a non-important photon was intentionally bounced into a position where it would be lost in the interference noise. To begin controlling the loss, they used a device known as a noiseless linear amplifier. This device appears to "catch" the errant photon, return it to the quantum state, and zoom it back into the healthy portion of the data when it works.

"A working long-distance quantum communication channel requires a mechanism to reduce this information loss, which is exactly what we did in our experiment," says researcher Sergei Slussarenko. "Our work implements a quantum relay, which is a critical component of this long-distance communication network."

The researchers plan to put this method to the test for long-distance quantum cryptography next. They can then dream about a truly secure global quantum network.

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