Quantum Entanglement Demonstrated Aboard Orbiting CubeSat

An international research team led by the National University of Singapore (NUS) has generated and detected quantum entanglement onboard a CubeSat nanosatellite weighing less than 2.6 kg and orbiting Earth. CubeSats are low-resource, cost-effective satellites and are smaller than a shoebox. As a first step, the researchers needed to demonstrate that a miniaturized photon source for quantum entanglement could remain intact through the stress of launch and operate successfully in the harsh environment of space within a satellite that provides minimal energy. They examined every component of the photon-pair source that would be used to generate quantum entanglement to see if it could be made smaller or more rugged. Researchers...