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For the first time in the history of quantum mechanics, scientists have been able to transmit a black and white image without having to send any physical particles. The phenomenon can be explained using the Zeno effect, the same effect that explains that movement itself is impossible.
The journal article is in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America (DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1614560114)
Wikipedia has an article about the quantum Zeno effect.
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How to Outwit Noise in Quantum Communication
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Direct Counterfactual Quantum Communication Claimed
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(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday May 19 2017, @03:46AM (2 children)
Oh, nevermind, they aren't communicating directly, they're hitching a ride on the phase information of a wave instead of a particle. No speed value to traders there.
To determine whether light appears in a channel, one refers to the amplitude of its wave function. However, in counterfactual communication, information is carried by the phase part of the wave function. Using a single-photon source, we experimentally demonstrate the counterfactual communication and successfully transfer a monochrome bitmap from one location to another by using a nested version of the quantum Zeno effect.
So, in a normal slide projector, you pass light through a patterned semi-transparent plate and the changes in amplitude of the passing light waves project the image.
In these guys' version, they're encoding their image information on the phase of single photon waves.
But, if photons are particles and waves at the same time, are they really communicating "without particles?" It seems to me that ignoring the photon's particle like properties doesn't make them cease to exist.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Sunday May 21 2017, @09:36AM (1 child)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday May 21 2017, @12:11PM
Fun extension: what happens when those wave packets get out of phase with each other?
Is that dark matter? Are we swimming in a universe of mostly out of phase wave packets, where we only see the ones that have become phase aligned?
🌻🌻 [google.com]