Quantum internet gets one step closer: What it is, what you need to know

We’ve been hearing about the quantum computing – advanced machines that will tap into the murky realm of quantum mechanics and far outstrip today’s supercomputers – for quite some time.

Today, with scientists announcing a major breakthrough towards the creation of a quantum internet, we’re one step closer to that reality.

The study entitled Qubit teleportation between non-neighbouring nodes in a quantum network by some researchers of the Kavli Institute of Nanoscience, QuTech, and Delft University of Technology was published in the journal Nature on 25 May.

Let’s take a look at what it is, how it works and what it means:

What is quantum internet?

As per The New York Times, “quantum internet” is a computer network that can send quantum information between distant machines.

Quantum teleportation can transfer information between locations without actually moving the physical matter that holds it.

So, what did scientists do?

As per the Independent, the group managed to teleport quantum information between two nodes of a three-node network (entitled Bob, Alice and Charlie respectively) that were not connected to each other.

That’s spooky…

Einstein certainly thought so.

In fact, he famously derided the principle of quantum entanglement – the change of one quantum system affecting the other – as ‘spooky action at a distance’.

Why is this important?

As per The New York Times, when data travels this way, without actually traveling the distance between the nodes, it cannot be lost.

To quote from The New York Times: “This technology could profoundly change the way data travels from place to place. It draws on more than a century of research involving quantum mechanics, a field of physics that governs the subatomic realm and behaves unlike anything we experience in our everyday lives. Quantum teleportation not only moves data between quantum computers, but it also does so in such a way that no one can intercept it”.

While that is impressive, it is important to note the nodes were only about 60 feet apart in the laboratory.

In practical terms?

As per Tech Times, the US department of energy published a blueprint explaining how fast this internet connectivity, once completed, could be.

Experts say quantum connectivity can transmit data at the speed of light, which is hundreds of thousands of miles per second. That would fundamentally transform everything we do online in ways we cannot imagine.

“This achievement is not only a win for fundamental science, but also represents an advance in the real-world problem solving required to move this fascinating quantum application to the next step,” wrote authors Oliver Slattery and Yong-Su Kim in a piece accompanying the study.

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