Category — Science
Breakthrough brings ‘Star Trek’ teleport a step closer
Breakthrough brings ‘Star Trek’ teleport a step closer
By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Published: 04 June 2007
Scientists have set a new record in sending information through thin air using the revolutionary technology of quantum teleportation - although Mr Spock may have to wait a little longer for a Scotty to beam him up with it.
A team of physicists has teleported data over a distance of 89 miles from the Canary Island of La Palma to the neighbouring island of Tenerife, which is 10 times further than the previous attempt at teleportation through free space.
The scientists did it by exploiting the “spooky” and virtually unfathomable field of quantum entanglement - when the state of matter rather than matter itself is sent from one place to another. Tiny packets or particles of light, photons, were used to teleport information between telescopes on the two islands. The photons did it by quantum entanglement and scientists hope it will form the basis of a way of sending encrypted data.
How to survive in a Black Hole
How to survive in a black hole
There’s no escape, but how can you maximize your remaining time?
So there you are: you discover that your spaceship has inadvertently slipped across the event horizon of a black hole — the boundary beyond which nothing, not even light, can escape the hole’s fearsome gravity. The only question is how you can maximize the time you have left. What do you do?
A common idea in physics is that you shouldn’t try to blast your way out of there. Black holes, it’s said, are like the popular view of quicksand: the harder you struggle, the worse things become.
But Geraint Lewis and Juliana Kwan of the University of Sydney in Australia say this is a myth. Their analysis of the problem, soon to be published in the Proceedings of the Astronomical Society of Australia(1), shows that in general your best bet is indeed to turn on the rocket’s engine. You’ll never escape, but you’ll live a little longer.
Falling into a black hole is a strange affair. Because the hole’s gravity distorts space-time, a far-off observer watching an object crossing the event horizon sees time for that object appear to slow down — a clock falling into a black hole would appear, from the outside, to tick ever slower. At the horizon itself, time stops, and the object stays frozen there for the remaining lifetime of the Universe.
