The concept of teleportation is really fascinating. With its roots in fiction, teleportation is defined as instantly traveling between two locations. However, fiction can sometimes cross over to reality, at least in part. Quantum teleportation has already been proven to teleport data. Now, scientists have successfully used it to teleport higher dimensional data in the form of teleporting images.
Higher dimensions of teleportation
An important premise is to understand how quantum teleportation works. At the core of everything in the universe are particles. By observing and researching these particles, scientists have discovered a property called entanglement. With proper preparation, the entangled particles will reflect the changes on one another no matter the distance, seemingly teleporting them. This is a different type of teleportation from the one we think about when hearing the word. Nonetheless, it could potentially be useful, especially in quantum computing, and it doesn’t stop there.
The scientists at Wits University just recorded the highest dimensionality of information quantum teleported to date. Just as sending 2D data via quantum teleportation is a notch above the traditional sending 0s and 1s one by one, this new method could teleport patterns of light in a much safer and faster way. One proposed practical use was that of fingerprint detection. Imagine a banking system that is uncompromisable as nothing happens between your scan and the bank; your fingerprint just teleports there.
Of course, this method is still in its infancy. The old record was sending three-dimensional data. In this context, the dimension relates to the number of parameters, which meant, at maximum, a 3-pixel image. While this new method of 15-dimensional, it still means that the potential teleported image is at an extremely low quality. However, this was made to be scalable. With more resources and further testing, this sort of teleportation of higher-quality images and other types of data could come sooner than we think.
Conclusion
While the foreseeable future doesn’t promise that humans or objects can teleported, the quantum teleportation of data can change our daily lives. Its implications could affect technology deeply in terms of sending, receiving, and reading information. Now that it’s not science fiction only anymore. We can theorize a day when you click download on a program, and suddenly, 50GB of data gets teleported to you. It needs time, perhaps a lot of time, but quantum teleportation of images could be the key to another technological advancement.
Photo credit: The feature image is owned by the University of the Witwatersrand and was made available as part of a press release.
Source: Wits University / Nature Communications
