Tossing out coins from a high-speed aircraft and making sure they fall into the slit of a moving piggy bank down below may seem highly absurd and perfectly implausible. However, China's new Quantum Science Satellite seeks to attempt the impossible of such kind.
The satellite's inception began on Aug. 16 in hopes to construct a massive space-based quantum communication nexus that would be virtually impossible to crack. Following the satellite launch, the team celebrated and cracked fireworks that lit up the night sky.
Before moving on to explaining what a quantum satellite really is, one must understand what quantum really implies. Quantum physics is essentially the understanding of energy and matter at the sub-atomic level, where the laws of classical physics simply do not stand coherent.
The latest satellite, named after the famous Chinese philosopher and scientist called Micius, is designed to relay the quantum elements which are called "keys." They're basically photons (light particles) which are arranged in a specific way.
The quantum science incorporated inside the Micius is such that it makes it impossible for anyone to hack encrypted keys without being detected. The impossibility of hacking further bolstered by ensuring that any attempt to hack into the system would immediately destroy the key of entangled or paired photons.
The Micius is a large-scale project and perhaps is the best reflection of today's modern day and age, specifically the 21st century. It's a rather futuristic concept that the public might not be able to readily understand at this point in time.
According to BBC, the project has vast potential to achieve especially in the domains of long-distance communication by the use of light particles and the much needed technology of quantum teleportation. The project wants to enable completely secure global communication.
The China Daily reports that Micius satellite stands 500 kilometers high. Its current purpose is to throw individual photons to stations on the ground in a state of mobility. The level of difficulty is unimaginable. It's analogous to tossing down coins from 10,000 meters above ground and those coins sliding down the narrow slit of a highly rotating piggy bank.
The project is a huge achievement for China, which has now become the world's first to achieve quantum communication via satellite. Scientists have claimed that this is only just the beginning and that Micius has the potential to answer more questions than ever imagined.
However, it was also claimed that there's a huge swath of territory that needs to be solved and Micius is a step to explore that anonymous territory. Scientists claim that much work is yet to be done before a practical quantum satellite network makes its inception.