Researchers have successfully teleported information using quantum mechanics.
A research team transferred information contained in a quantum bit to separate bit located three meters away, a Delft University of Technology news release reported.
The technique could allow quantum computers to communicate with each other in a "quantum internet."
This type of internet could allow for ultra-secure data transfer.
To accomplish the feat researchers used a concept called "entanglement."
"Entanglement is arguably the strangest and most intriguing consequence of the laws of quantum mechanics," head of the research project, Prof. Ronald Hanson, said in the news release. "When two particles become entangled, their identities merge: their collective state is precisely determined but the individual identity of each of the particles has disappeared. The entangled particles behave as one, even when separated by a large distance. The distance in our tests was three [meters], but in theory the particles could be on either side of the universe. Einstein didn't believe in this prediction and called it 'spooky action at a distance'. Numerous experiments, on the other hand, agree with the existence of entanglement."
The team is the first to successfully transfer information between quibits; they used electrons found in diamonds to produce these quibits.
"We use diamonds because 'mini prisons' for electrons are formed in this material whenever a nitrogen atom is located in the position of one of the carbon atoms. The fact that we're able to view these miniature prisons individually makes it possible for us to study and verify an individual electron and even a single atomic nucleus," Hanson said.
In the future the team hopes to achieve the same thing at a distance of 1,300 meters.
The experiment could meet the criteria of the "loophole-free Bell test" and could disprove Einstein's rejection of entanglement once and for all.
