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Entanglement on a Chip: Breakthrough Promises Secure Communications and Faster Computers

posted by janrinok on Tuesday January 27 2015, @05:12PM   
from the flying-cars,-internet-privacy,-and-secure-comms-for-all dept.

AnonTechie writes:

Unlike Bilbo's magic ring, which entangles human hearts, engineers have created a new micro-ring that entangles individual particles of light, an important first step in a whole host of new technologies.

Entanglement - the instantaneous connection between two particles no matter their distance apart - is one of the most intriguing and promising phenomena in all of physics. Properly harnessed, entangled photons could revolutionize computing, communications, and cyber security. Though readily created in the lab and by comparatively large-scale optoelectronic components, a practical source of entangled photons that can fit onto an ordinary computer chip has been elusive.

New research, reported today in The Optical Society's (OSA) new high-impact journal Optica, describes how a team of scientists has developed, for the first time, a microscopic component that is small enough to fit onto a standard silicon chip that can generate a continuous supply of entangled photons.

http://phys.org/news/2015-01-entanglement-chip-breakthrough-faster.html

[Abstract]: http://www.opticsinfobase.org/optica/abstract.cfm?uri=optica-2-2-88

[Paper]: http://arxiv.org/abs/1409.4881

• Think about the possibilities Think about the possibilities (Score: 2, Interesting) by hopp on Wednesday January 28 2015, @06:04AM

  by hopp (2833) on Wednesday January 28 2015, @06:04AM (#138768)

  Properly harnessed on the right scale entanglement is anti-gravity; it is also (by corollary) anti-friction. That is perpetual motion and limitless power. So, probably no, this is not a thing.

  /If it turns out to be I'll eat my hat
  //If I had a hat

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• Re:Think about the possibilities (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @08:24AM

  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 28 2015, @08:24AM (#138799)

  Huh? I don't know where you got either of those ideas. Entangled photons have been made with laboratory setups for a while. No idea what they have to do with anti-gravity. They certainly don't have anything to do with friction because friction doesn't even exist at the microscopic scale anymore the quantum scale. It's an emergent macro-scale phenomenon. A convenient way to talk about the fact that you can't line up everything perfectly at the micro scale.

  Parent