Scientific Developments
|
Radio Australia presents: |
| Quizzes & Games |
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Science through timeKarl, ABC Radio, Australia ► Dr Karl on Triple J - downloads
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Health & Science
|
| And, here are the main menu items: |
Research results published by the BBC !
Brain Fingerprints under Scrutiny
Great ABC compilation !
Nature's engines of destruction
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Pentagon warns: climate change will destroy us
in less than 20 years!
Siberian climate in Europe soon?
"... at the moment even at the speed of light it would take
100,000
years to cross the galaxy."
"The speed of light may not be a constant."
Shedding new light on
the speed of
light
An article by the ABC on Einstein's Theory of Relativity !
Believe it or not!
Nanotechnology
Mobile Phones
Fascinating New Data
by the BBC
Saturn Rings Have Own Atmosphere
Space Dust and Pyramids
| Stem Cell Research Video |
| From
the tiniest embryonic cell to the eldest adult, humans are “fearfully and wonderfully made” by the Creator of the universe. |
Teleportation
(both articles further below, on this page)
Universe
Some
of the most fascinating aspects!
Australia's ABC No. 1 series based on a conversation with
UK's renowned
scientist Paul Davis.
THE BIG QUESTIONS
http://www.abc.net.au/science/bigquestions/default.htm
MORE
BIG
QUESTIONS
http://www.abc.net.au/science/morebigquestions/
Science 'Beyond 3000'
Australian teleport breakthrough
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
It is a long way from Star Trek, but teleportation - the disembodiment of an object in one location and its reconstruction in another - has been successfully carried out in a physics lab in Australia.
Scientists at the Australian National University (ANU) made a beam of light disappear in one place and reappear in another a short distance away.
The achievement confirms that in theory teleportation is possible, at least for sub-atomic particles; whether it can be done for larger systems, such as atoms, remains to be seen.
The more likely applications will come in telecommunications, enabling much faster transfer of data and the use of encryption that can never be broken.
Will we ever be able to teleport humans?
Teleportation has been one of the hottest topics among physicists working in quantum mechanics - the study of the fundamental structure of matter.
Some 40 labs around the world are currently trying to teleport a laser beam after pioneering work in 1998 at the California Institute of Technology showed it should be possible.
'Spooky interaction'
The Australian researchers have exploited a phenomenon called "quantum entanglement", which links the properties of two photons of light created at the same time. Einstein called it a "spooky interaction".
What it means is that two photons can be created and sent to different places. It is possible to force one photon into a specific quantum mechanical state and, because the two photons are connected in some way, the other photon will instantaneously take up a complementary state.
At first sight, entanglement offers the prospect of sending a signal faster than the speed of light. But a closer look at what is actually possible shows that this will not work because of the limits of what can be known about quantum mechanical systems and how such information is relayed.
But it may offer the prospect of a Star Trek-style transporter.
'Exciting applications'
Using quantum entanglement, ANU physicist Ping Koy Lam has disassembled laser light at one end of an optical communications system and recreated a replica just a metre away.
An encoded signal is embedded in an input stream of photons, which is entangled with another beam.
Elsewhere in the lab, the beam of photons and the associated signal is reconstituted.
"What we have demonstrated here is that we can take billions of photons, destroy them simultaneously, and then recreate them in another place," Dr Lam says.
"The applications of teleportation for computers and communications over the next decade are very exciting," he adds.
Body movement
Quantum teleportation could make encrypted or coded information 100% secure, Dr Lam said, because even if intercepted the message would be unintelligible unless it was intended for a specific recipient.
"It should be possible to construct a perfect cryptography system. When two parties want to communicate with one another, we can enable the secrecy of the communication to be absolutely perfect."
But for a human to be teleported, a machine would have to be built that could pinpoint and analyse the trillions and trillions of atoms that make up the human body.
"I think teleporting of that kind is very, very far away," Dr Lam says. "We don't know how to do that with a single atom yet."
Quantum teleporting is problematic for humans because the original is destroyed in the process of creating the replica.
back
to top
back to 'Teleportation'
headlines
Q&A: Teleportation
Australian researchers say they have been able to teleport the light from a laser from one part of a laboratory to another. BBC News Online Science Editor, Dr David Whitehouse, answers some basic questions about teleportation.
Moving beams of light around sounds like a clever trick, is it relevant to me?
The ultra-fast computers of the future will be based on beams of light that exploit the strange properties of the sub-atomic or quantum mechanical world. Using light and quantum mechanics offers the prospect of computers trillions of times more powerful than we have today. The first, tentative but encouraging, steps have been made towards primitive quantum computers.
Australians teleport laser light beam
Will we ever be able to move solid objects around?
Highly unlikely. It seems we can move photons of light around and photons do not weigh anything. Perhaps in a few years, we could teleport a single atom. Some researchers believe that we may be able to teleport a virus but they will not say when.
I've seen stuff like this on Star Trek? How would a Star Trek transporter work in real life?
The idea is that a human body is broken down into information and transmitted in some way to another place where that information is used to rebuild the human. Personally, I would take the train.
OK, crystal ball time - at the end of this century, how far could things have advanced?
It is always difficult to speculate about the future. But that will not stop me. We may be able to teleport a molecule, perhaps a few tens of atoms. That would be a great scientific achievement but not a useful matter transporter.
And will we ever transport a human?
To teleport a human would require knowledge of the type and exact position and movement of every atom of the person to be teleported. That is about a hundred thousand million million million million atoms. To send that information down today's fast data transfer systems would take a hundred million times longer than the present age of the Universe (which is about 15 thousand million years).
If it is ever possible, there is the question of whether destroying a human to teleport their information to another place to rebuild them again would constitute murder, and you might also want to discuss if the teleported human would actually be the original person or a copy.
Sure I would get in a transporter. Hang on, what if a fly is teleported with you?
Richard, UK
"There is more to life than just the physical form"
Morgan, New Zealand
Seems to me, if a transporter were ever built like the ones on StarTrek, they would be able to scan every tiny detail down to the atomic level, and and then transmit that data to another like terminal that could then reconstruct all that info in to an exact duplicate. Transport the original, not likely, but transport an exact copy, sure, why not?
William R. Vire, US
Anyone wanting to use a teleport initially would have to get over the major hurdle of fearing death. To their friends on the receiving end of the it they would be saying: "Wow! It worked after all". Their fear, now a copy from the original, would subside with more and more uses of it. Even looking at it logically like that, I would have a hard time persuading myself to use it.
Paul Smith, UK
There is more to life than just the physical form. I'm not talking about a soul, though many will want to. I'm talking about the difference between a living being and a dead one. Im also talking about the billions of billions of electrical processes in the brain, and also the information that gets sent around a living being, the nervous system. Can that information be preserved? And sent? And Reconstructed? If a person were reciting a poem in their head at the moment of "teleportation", would their thoughts continue at the point they left off when their body is reconstructed?
Morgan, New Zealand
For years men have considered various ways to eliminate the troublesome burden of a mother-in-law. It seems we are on the verge of a solution. Teleport her. If it takes thousands of years, so what? If she is not the same when reassembled, then perhaps all the better.
Bob Baumann, New York City, US
Great idea guys! This would save congestion on Britains motorways!
David, UK
It's just another toy for the scientist around the world to play around with. Why are these people developing teleporters, and spending God knows how much money on these devices, which are going to be used for what? And yet there are millions of people around the world, thinking why isn't the government spending any money to beat starvation, poverty, diseases...
Barry Sylvester, Korea
I like it a lot and I firmly believe that someday in the near future teleportation of human beings will be possible. Accordingly, when it happens and proved with no failures, I will be glad to teleport on (in) it.
Mekbib Adgeh, US
In what way can teleportation be useful in quantum computers? Won't the time/speed for a calcuation to be performed or information transferred be restricted by the physical connections carrying the information to various parts of the machine?
Matt, Australia
It seems that the fabulous and manifestly useful work done at ANU is less "teleporting" photons from one place to another (same photons), but rather "replicating" photons with identical properties at a distance. Is this so? If it is, then why all this talk of teleporting, rather than "distance replicating" or some other such phrase?
Ann, Singapore
You say that maybe this teletransporter could someday be used to transport very tiny bits of matter. Could someone someday use it to impregnate a woman without her knowledge by teletransporting sperm? and would that be considered rape?
Don, US
back to top back to 'Teleportation' headlines
Scientific Developments
Highway to the South Pole
By Dr David Whitehouse
BBC News Online science editor
A team of engineers has begun constructing one of the most difficult "roads" ever attempted: a 1,600-kilometre (1,000 miles) overland route to the South Pole.
It is hoped that the snow highway will some day become a regular surface route from McMurdo Station on the Antarctic coast to the Amundsen-Scott base, freeing up ski-equipped supply planes for other missions.
Over the next two years, the engineers will slowly mark out the trail. If successful, it will show tractors can be a reliable and efficient way of getting fuel and food to the South Pole.
The route will be the first over-snow, heavy-equipment traverse by the US Antarctic programme since 1968, although the Russians regularly supply their Vostok base by tractor convoys.
Abandoned tractor
In principle, the route is simple: just head south. Or rather, east from McMurdo Sound then traverse the Ross Ice Shelf, ascend the Leverett Glacier and turn due south for the Pole.
The pathfinding engineers reported that the first 48 km (30 miles) were relatively easy but then they had to cross an ice-shear zone.
Project manager John Wright told the Antarctic Sun newspaper: "The shear zone is the single, unavoidable obstacle that any traverse outbound from McMurdo contemplating travel on the Ross Ice Shelf must face."
In one previous excursion in 1991, the surface gave way under a tractor moving across the shear zone. The crew were rescued several hours later, but the tractor is still there.
The hazardous belt of crevasses is there because the Ross Ice Shelf moves faster than the McMurdo Ice Shelf. The ice between them has one end held back while the other is pushed forward, leading to multiple fractures.
Ice 'pot holes'
To make the road safe, the engineers had to find and fill in every crevasse on the route.
A jeep-sized tracked vehicle, called a Pisten Bully, led the way, peering ahead with a ground-penetrating radar held in front on a boom. When a crevasse was found, it had to be dynamited open and then filled.
Eventually, after much toil, the snow dumped into the crevasse would compact itself, leaving a solid, safe surface for the bulldozers to smooth over.
The entire shear zone moves north towards the sea at the rate of up to a metre a day, so the road will have moved significantly in a year. Flags will mark the road and form a grid around the shear-zone.
"You damn sure better not get off the road," Wright says. "The place is full of crevasses."
Forge the trail
In total, the engineers completed about 140 km (87 miles) of road before the Antarctic winter set in.
Next Antarctic spring, a larger convoy of tractors and trailers will set out for the Leverett Glacier, the chosen route through the Transantarctic Mountains.
If all goes well, in 2004-05, the convoy will go the full distance to the South Pole and back, carrying cargo to demonstrate it can be done.
"The idea is to forge this trail, not a road, but a trail, that may become a snow road in future years," Wright says.
It is estimated that a convoy of tractors pulling full trailers could deliver supplies to the South Pole without using as much fuel as aircraft. Of course, it would take longer - 30 days instead of six hours.
Equipment too large to be carried in an aircraft could be delivered, allowing a new phase of scientific research to be carried out at the South Pole.