More than 700 optical fibers with two ground-satellite links to distribute quantum keys over 4,600 kilometers They constitute what is the first quantum communication network in the world.
Behind the project, as published in A study in Nature, is a team of Chinese scientists led by Jianwei Pan, Yuao Chen, Chengzhi Peng from the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei (USTC).
Impossible to hack
Quantum communication is based on quantum key exchange (QKD), which uses the quantum states of particles to form a chain of zeros and ones, while any interference between the sender and receiver will change this chain or key and will be noticed immediately: therefore, unlike conventional encryption, quantum communication considered unhackable.
Specifically, the foundation of this technology lies in the fact that each pair of entangled photons encodes one bit of key information. Its entanglement guarantees that if one of the photons is altered, for example, because someone has managed to observe it, its physical properties change instantly and the entanglement is broken, so the encrypted message cannot be violated.
Until now, the most common QKD technology uses optical fibers for transmissions of several hundred kilometers, with high stability but considerable channel loss, but researchers have gone further using a new technology called dual-field QKD (TF-QKD).
They also aim to develop small-scale and cost-effective QKD satellites and ground receivers, as well as medium and high Earth orbit satellites to achieve ten thousand kilometer level QKD all the time. For its part, the European Union has also launched an initiative called the European Union Quantum Communication Initiative
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The news
World's first integrated quantum communication network established in China
was originally published in
Xataka Science
by
Sergio Parra
.