Researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute at the University of Copenhagen have created an atomic memory that in the future may be able to break the limits to Internet communication.

The Internet is getting faster and faster – something that we all take for granted. However, communication on the Internet takes place via tiny pulses of light that are continually becoming weaker as the network handles the increasing flow of information. Soon, we will reach the limit for how weak the pulses can be and still be able to function as information carriers. When that happens, we will have reached the limit for the Internet as we know it today.

But a new type of Internet, a so-called Quantum Internet, where information is encoded in quantum properties of tiny pulses, opens up completely new possibilities. In order that the new network to function in practice, it is first necessary to create new ways to detect and store light information in atoms, a so-called quantum memory. And that is exactly what the researchers have created.

In addition to opening the door to new types of communication, the researcher’s achievement resonates in basic research circles. For atomic memory is a huge leap forward for that type of researcher, especially in the area that deals with phenomena at the atomic level, so-called quantum information.

Behind this quantum-mechanic breakthrough is Eugene Polzik, professor, Brian Julsgaard, assistant research professor, and Jacob Sherson, PhD student from the Danish National Research Foundation Centre for Quantum Optics at the Niels Bohr Institute. The work has been carried out in cooperation with researchers from Germany and the Czeck Republic.

The team’s breakthrough was published in the scientific journal, Nature, on 25 November 2004, informs a press release by the Niels Bohr Institute.

More information: Niels Bohr Institute