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http://science.howstuffworks.com/teleportation1.htm 2008/11/02
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How Teleportation Will Work Science Videos

by Kevin Bonsor

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Inside this Article

1. Introduction to How 4. Lots More Information
Teleportation Will Work 5. See all Physics articles
2. Teleportation: Recent
Experiments More Science Videos »
3. Human Teleportation

Teleportation: Recent Experiments

In 1998, physicists at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), along with two European groups,
turned the IBM ideas into reality by successfully teleporting a photon, a particle of energy that carries
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light. The Caltech group was able to read the atomic structure of a photon, send this information across
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In performing the experiment, the Caltech group was able to get around the Heisenberg Uncertainty
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entanglement, at least three photons are needed to achieve quantum teleportation: LI-COR Light Sensors
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z Photon A: The photon to be teleported www.licor.com
z Photon B: The transporting photon
z Photon C: The photon that is entangled with photon B

If researchers tried to look too closely at photon A without entanglement, they would bump it, and
thereby change it. By entangling photons B and C, researchers can extract some information about
photon A, and the remaining information would be passed on to B by way of entanglement, and then on
to photon C. When researchers apply the information from photon A to photon C, they can create an
exact replica of photon A. However, photon A no longer exists as it did before the information was sent
to photon C.
In other words, when Captain Kirk beams down to an alien planet, an analysis of his atomic structure is
passed through the transporter room to his desired location, where a replica of Kirk is created and the
original is destroyed.

In 2002, researchers at the Australian National University successfully teleported a laser beam.

The most recent successful teleportation experiment took place on October 4, 2006 at the Niels Bohr
Institute in Copenhagen, Denmark. Dr. Eugene Polzik and his team teleported information stored in a
laser beam into a cloud of atoms. According to Polzik, "It is one step further because for the first time it
involves teleportation between light and matter, two different objects. One is the carrier of information
and the other one is the storage medium" [CBC]. The information was teleported about 1.6 feet (half a
meter).

Quantum teleportation holds promise for quantum computing. These experiments are important in
developing networks that can distribute quantum information. Professor Samuel Braunstein, of the
University of Wales, Bangor, called such a network a "quantum Internet." This technology may be used
one day to build a quantum computer that has data transmission rates many times faster than today's
most powerful computers.

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Inside this Article

1. Introduction to How Teleportation Will Work 4. Lots More Information
2. Teleportation: Recent Experiments 5. See all Physics articles
3. Human Teleportation

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HowStuffWorks "Entanglement and Recent Experiments" Page 3 of 3

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http://science.howstuffworks.com/teleportation1.htm 2008/11/02