  We explore the capability of spin-1/2 chains to act as quantum channels for
both teleportation and transfer of qubits. Exploiting the emergence of
long-distance entanglement in low-dimensional systems [Phys. Rev. Lett. 96,
247206 (2006)], here we show how to obtain high communication fidelities
between distant parties. An investigation of protocols of teleportation and
state transfer is presented, in the realistic situation where temperature is
included. Basing our setup on antiferromagnetic rotationally invariant systems,
both protocols are represented by pure depolarizing channels. We propose a
scheme where channel fidelity close to one can be achieved on very long chains
at moderately small temperature.
