Issue 13 September/October 2011
Quantum
HEALTH
New Record Set for Entangled Photons
The quantum realm has been called “weird” by more than a few physicists, mostly because phenomena that can happen there can’t—at least according to the current scientifi c mindset— happen here, in our everyday world, where Newtonian physics appears to trump quantum processes. But the game is on to keep pushing the boundaries between what we think is possible and what is possible. The Chinese have just declared that they are in the game to win. Physics News (
www.physnews.org) reports (June 11, 102) that Chinese scientists have smashed the record for entangling the greatest number of photons—eight. What’s more, they not
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only entangled them, but were able to observe them in action and manipulate them as well, a technically diffi cult feat.
Entanglement is a core feature of the quantum realm, describing how separate entities can become so highly correlated that they function as one unit—instantly affecting one another no matter the distance between them. In this experiment, a team from the University of Science and Technology of China fi rst created a single pair of entangled photons, and then repeated the procedure until they had created a total of eight entangled photons. That may not sound like a lot, but it is enormously diffi cult for scientists to entangle photons, or other particles or molecules, with any stability over time. The quantum bond is extremely fragile, which is why quantum computers—and other quantum technologies— are being developed at an excruciatingly slow pace. Thus, one of the signifi cant achievements of this experiment was the stability of the entangled photons. Reporters have called this achievement “stunning” and “amazing,” and as a reporter at Technology Review descriptively explained, “Getting eight photons exactly where you want them at the same time is the quantum mechanical equivalent of herding cats. . . .” It is hoped that using the techniques the Chinese team developed, the record for the most photons entangled will be repeatedly and rapidly broken.
Quantum Health 25
Science in the News
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