Engineers Send Quantum Signals With Standard Internet Protocol (phys.org)
- Reference: 0178922582
- News link: https://tech.slashdot.org/story/25/08/29/0043214/engineers-send-quantum-signals-with-standard-internet-protocol
- Source link: https://phys.org/news/2025-08-quantum-standard-internet-protocol.html
> In a first-of-its-kind experiment, engineers at the University of Pennsylvania brought quantum networking out of the lab and onto commercial fiber-optic cables [1]using the same Internet Protocol (IP) that powers today's web . Reported in [2]Science , the work shows that fragile quantum signals can run on the same infrastructure that carries everyday online traffic. The team tested their approach on Verizon's campus fiber-optic network. The Penn team's tiny "Q-chip" coordinates quantum and classical data and, crucially, speaks the same language as the modern web. That approach could pave the way for a future "quantum internet," which scientists believe may one day be as transformative as the dawn of the online era.
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> Quantum signals rely on pairs of "entangled" particles, so closely linked that changing one instantly affects the other. Harnessing that property could allow quantum computers to link up and pool their processing power, enabling advances like faster, more energy-efficient AI or designing new drugs and materials beyond the reach of today's supercomputers. Penn's work shows, for the first time on live commercial fiber, that a chip can not only send quantum signals but also automatically correct for noise, bundle quantum and classical data into standard internet-style packets, and route them using the same addressing system and management tools that connect everyday devices online.
"By showing an integrated chip can manage quantum signals on a live commercial network like Verizon's, and do so using the same protocols that run the classical internet, we've taken a key step toward larger-scale experiments and a practical quantum internet," says Liang Feng, Professor in Materials Science and Engineering (MSE) and in Electrical and Systems Engineering (ESE), and the Science paper's senior author.
"This feels like the early days of the classical internet in the 1990s, when universities first connected their networks," added Robert Broberg, a doctoral student in ESE and co-author of the paper. "That opened the door to transformations no one could have predicted. A quantum internet has the same potential."
[1] https://phys.org/news/2025-08-quantum-standard-internet-protocol.html
[2] https://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.adx6176
Re: (Score:3)
> Given quantum bandwidth decays exponentially with distance I don't know what people think this technology is ever going to do for anyone. There will never be geographically scalable interconnection of quantum computers and the only other use of this technology is an extremely niche market to improve forward security of high security crypto.
You're not thinking big enough. Once AI takes over all the jobs and the owner class can kill most of us off, we'll cover most of the planet with quantum devices that are interconnected and finally have enough processing power available to the AIs to make a non-shitty cat video.
packet loss (Score:2)
> Quantum signals rely on pairs of "entangled" particles, so closely linked that changing one instantly affects the other
Packet loss says hello. Turns out the Verizon's campus fiber network is nothing like the actual internet.
Quantum encryption is no panacea. (Score:2)
Quantum encryption can. protect your data in transit, but the devices at either end can be, and will be, hacked
Hmmm... (Score:2)
I'm really dreading what happens with DNS on a quantum Internet. DNS is already enough of a pain without REAL heisenbugs.
No spooky action at a distance! (Score:3)
> so closely linked that changing one instantly affects the other
Not true. QM is weird, but has yet to demonstrate superluminal causality.
More accurately, a measurement of one tells us something about the other that we did not know before.
Why is that weird? Its a long story, yadda yadda Bell's inequality, blah blah
So ok, the wave equation instantly changes at a distance, but that is not a real thing, it cannot be observed. In the words of Monty Python, "It's just a model".
Poor journalism (Score:2)
"pairs of "entangled" particles, so closely linked that changing one instantly affects the other."
That's not how entanglement works. But I see now why so many people expect quantum mechanics to give us faster-than-light communication networks.
Cable companies are dinosaurs (Score:3)
I’m guessing copper is out. Fiber proves to be a superior tech, once again.