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Quantum Entanglement Survives, Even Across an Event Horizon

StartsWithABang writes: One of the more puzzling phenomena in our quantum Universe is that of entanglement: two particles remain in mutually indeterminate states until one is measured, and then the other — even if it's across the Universe — is immediately known. In theory, this should be true even if one member of the pair falls into a black hole, although it's impossible to measure that. However, we can (and have) measured that for the laboratory analogue of black holes, known as "dumb holes," and the entanglement survives!

4 of 152 comments (clear)

  1. Re:So.. for a non-physicist by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    1. No. The maximum speed is the speed of light in quantum mechanics. Entanglement doesn't even have a speed. It is, from all measurements that have been done, valid in any reference frame.
    2. No. c is defined in terms of time, not the other way around.
    3. No. The correlations from entanglement transfer zero bits of information. They can only be observed with the assistance of normal communication channels. Combining the two allows you to hide but not send data.
    4. Obligatory xkcd: No.

  2. Information is lost by mbone · · Score: 3, Informative

    What I think is the really important thing in the original paper is that information actually seems to be lost in the black hole. There is an enormous amount of theoretical musing about how to prevent information loss at event horizons (remember the black hole firewall?); this, if taken seriously, could have implications in quite a number of areas in theoretical physics.

  3. Re:So.. for a non-physicist by burtosis · · Score: 3, Informative

    To offer a simple explanation no it cannot send information faster than light. You can have these instant correlations but as the latest research actually shows, the values are truly random until measurement. So you can send these entangled photons and unpack one at one location and another at a second remote location and know you have the correlating bit but without knowing what that is, which must be sent classically, you have no idea what is being sent. Moreover currently i know of no experiment that preserves entanglement after measurement so you must also wait classically for the particles to arrive before taking the instant correlation measurement.

  4. Re:So.. for a non-physicist by interval1066 · · Score: 3, Informative
    No.

    "The no-communication theorem states that, within the context of quantum mechanics, it is not possible to transmit classical bits of information by means of carefully prepared mixed or pure states, whether entangled or not."

    See The No-Communication Theorem and the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen Paradox.

    --
    Python: 'And then suddenly you have a language which says "we're all stuck with whatever the whiniest coder wants".'