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Physics

City-wide quantum communication network in China is most advanced yet

A network that connects quantum devices and a central server that spans Hefei, China, can allow multiple secure quantum chats at once

By Karmela Padavic-Callaghan

14 September 2023

New Scientist. Science news and long reads from expert journalists, covering developments in science, technology, health and the environment on the website and the magazine.

Quantum memory is a big advance in quantum networks

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The most advanced quantum communication network yet sprawls through the city of Hefei, China. Comprising three quantum devices and a central server, it is as close to an unhackable quantum internet as we have gotten yet.

Built by Jian-Long Liu at the University of Science and Technology of China and his colleagues, the network shares some features with conventional communication networks, such as transmitting information through optical fibres. But the light travelling in the quantum network comes in chunks whose quantum states encode the information and have properties not…

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