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What if there was a faster way to get from your home to the movies without riding a bike or driving a car? What if you could visit your family on the opposite coast without hopping on a plane? How would it feel if you could go on your dream vacation in the morning and be back at work in the afternoon? Or have lunch by the Pyramids and be back at your desk before the hours are up? Well, we have the answer to all your speedy travel needs: Teleportation
Since time immemorial, man has been trying to come up with faster and more efficient ways of going from one place to another. And so far, we have been very, very successful. The invention of the wheel has made Chariots, Bicycles and Automobiles possible.
It was not long after Trains, Ships, Airplanes and even Spacecrafts soon followed suit. We can now go to places thousands (and even millions) of miles away fast and easy. The development of transportation has allowed us to cross mountains and rivers, countries and continents – places we would never be able to go to with just our own two feet.
But all our present modes of transportation have one common limitation: we still have to cross nature’s barriers to get to places. However, unlike the traditional methods of transportation, teleportation does not require us to physically cross the distance to get to your desired place. As a method of travel, teleportation works by dematerializing an object at its current location and causing its precise atomic configurations to transport and be reconstructed at another spot.
Thus, the science of teleportation holds a lot of promise. With the time it takes to travel drastically cut, going to and from places has become a lot easier. This could open a whole new world of travel, communication and business opportunities. With time and space immaterial, travel will become faster, easier and more efficient.
But is quantum teleportation possible?
Indeed it is! Researchers at IBM led by physicist Charles Bennett have confirmed this. Through their experiments, these scientists have discovered that teleportation of a photon is possible. However, it comes with a not so desirable downside though – the original teleported object ends up being destroyed.
Still, scientists have not given up, and are continuing their search for improved means to transport objects while precisely reconstructing its data at another location.
Does this mean that we could also be uttering the phrase “Beam me up, Scotty” in the near future?
Not quite, as our current developments in teleportation are still light years away from discovering technology that comes close to Star Trek’s Transporter. We are currently bound by a speed limit that nature imposed: we can only travel as fast as the speed of light. To teleport, man has to break this barrier and move faster than light, which the laws of physics say is impossible.
Thus, human teleportation is unfortunately still far from reality. A person has trillions of atoms in his body and for teleportation to be successful, each of these atoms has to be reconstructed in the other location with exact precision. A millimeter out of place could mean neurological and physiological defects – a missing arm, half a brain or even death.
Still, scientists are on a mission to improve on this infant technology. Who knows, it just might be possible in the future. Is teleportation sounding like a good option? Or would you rather just take the bus?
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