Schrödinger’s Telephone

A faster-than-light telephone for interstellar distances!

Wait… Faster than light?!?

I know what you are thinking: Nothing can go faster than light!Well… True… but there is something called “quantum entanglement”. The effects of quantum entanglement work instantly at any distance. Even all the way across the universe.

Why is this?

We don’t really know exactly why it is like this, but we do know that when you go down to the atomic level, Quantum Theory takes over, and Newtonian Physics (our everyday normal physics) doesn’t apply anymore. Quantum Theory is weird and spooky, but it is true.

So what does quantum entanglement do?

It can instantly change the quantum properties (such as spin) of an atom by changing the quantum properties of another atom that is entangled with it. This works instantly at any distance.

So about Schrodinger’s Telephone…

Schrodinger’s Telephone is basically just a messaging system that sends messages instantly by taking advantage of quantum entanglement. I thought of this idea myself, but maybe someone else has thought of it also. I’m not sure.

How does this work?

The system works by having two atoms entangled together. One of those atoms has two other atoms that it can entangle with. One of those atoms has a up spin and the other has a down spin. The two original atoms work like bits: they either have an up spin or a down spin (when measured). The atoms both have the same spin. When you entangle the up spin with one of the original atoms, the original atom will have an up spin. So now both of the original atoms have an up spin, and this information was transferred instantly. You can do the same for down spin.

But that only has two options, you can’t make a message out of that!

True! But that was only one! You could have an array of these to create a full instant video chat! How awesome would it be to have a video chat with your fellow astronaut friend on mars!

How much information can be sent?

Well, it depends on how many of these you make, but let’s see how much memory can be sent…

1 entanglement: 2 possibilities; enough to work as a on off switch2 entanglements: 4 possibilities; enough to make 2 on off switches6 entanglements: 64 possibilities20 entanglements: 1,048,576 possibilities; enough to have a black and white video chat with a 1000x1000 pixel screen.64 entanglements: 18,446,744,073,709,551,616 possibilities; enough to run Windows!

As you can see, this has exponential growth and with just 64 entanglements, you could be surfing the web on a distant planet!

How to entangle atoms