Microwave

China’s Entangling Photons to Detect Stealth Aircraft

Go back two years to September, 2016, and China’s Electronics Technology Group Corporation’s 14th Institute announced completion of a quantum radar, albeit with a short range of 60 miles (100 km). A microwave beam is used to entangle photons with an optical “idler beam”. The microwave beam is sent from the radar, strikes the stealth target, and returns to the radar site. At the site, the microwave photons are compared with the idler beam photons. Hence, not using radio waves which stealth aircraft are designed to thwart, the photons are capable of providing the position of the stealth aircraft. From this, direction, speed, and other data may be gleaned. It is surmised the radar may be part of the sensor-suite to be carried aboard China’s sub-space airship, Yuanmeng (see image).

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Superconducting Qubit Transferred Via Coaxial Cable

Physicists at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, Switzerland, have successfully transferred two qubits via coaxial cable. Using a microwave photon resonator to transmit the qubit state, the quantum state was successfully transmitted to a second qubit through the cable; a distance of about 2 meters. With a transmission success rate of 80 percent, the process was repeatable upwards of 50,000 times per second. The team’s next goal is to enable entanglement swapping – using qubits to transmit and receive. If successful, the technique could open up avenues for larger quantum computers. 

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