On Monday, the Department of Energy’s advanced research facility at Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico revealed they’ve had a functioning quantum Internet for more than two years.
The basic idea is that the act of measuring a quantum object, such as a photon, always changes it. So any attempt to eavesdrop on a quantum message cannot fail to leave telltale signs of snooping that the receiver can detect.
Quantum cryptography functions well in fiber, but the photons that carry the encryption keys fade out after 200 kilometers or so. But not in space.
That’s why Canada’s Com Dev is hoping to launch a space-based quantum cryptography experiment which could link labs (or banks) across the country.
In 2016, China plans on launching a satellite dedicated to quantum science experiments, ahead of the ESA and NASA.
Perhaps the Los Alamos announcement indicates researchers at the Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC), in Waterloo, Ontario, may be ready to announce something big. The news from Canada’s Perimeter Institute doesn’t suffer from atomic security.
According to Thomas Jennewein and Brendon Higgins, the first step towards space-based quantum communication would be to place a satellite in a low-Earth orbit (LEO) – at an altitude of less than 2000 km.
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