Quantum physics could, theoretically, be used to fulfill the age old desire to teleport. However, any practical use is a an extremely long way off, with scientists only managing single particles so far.

In the video below, minutephysics explain how teleportation could be theoretically possible using quantum physics. Quantum teleportation uses quantum entanglement — a situation where one set of particles is dependent on the state of another. In principle, if scientists create specific sets of particles that are capable of being rearranged into whatever they wish to teleport, they can send partial information about one end of the entanglement — encoded as a quantum state — and thereby produce it in the other end. As an analogy: imagine taking a scan of what you want to transport, sending it to the other entangled particles, and rebuilding it from that.

While being able to transport anything large, like a cat — the example the video uses — is a long way off, scientists have managed to transport a single photon or electron about 100km. The difficulty lies in creating two entangled sets of particles and subsequently transporting one of them without it becoming disentangled.

This is linked to scientists achieving direct counterfactual quantum communication for the first time recently, which operates using the Zeno effect (freezing the situation by observing it) rather than entanglement. In the experiment, scientists successfully transported information using the phase of light.

References: YouTube, Science Alert

Article was originally published on Futurism.

Star Trek is by now said to have encouraged a whole host of current devices from the iPad to the holodeck's 'virtual reality'. Now a very famous theoretical physicist says that even its teleporter is technically very much possible, and it could become an actuality before the end of the century. Professor Michio Kaku said that the several breakthroughs required to transport humans rapidly have already been made, and it's not far when we will be 'beaming' across the cosmos. Michio Kaku is a professor at City University in New York.  Dr .Michio Kaku said “You know the expression "Beam me up Scotty"? We used to laugh at it. We used to laugh when someone talked about teleportation, but we don't laugh anymore. Quantum teleportation already exists [and] I think within a decade we will teleport the first molecule.”

He also said that, as humans we have already achieved this at an atomic level, reports The Express.  The phenomenon is called quantum entanglement and it permits links to be made between atoms, with their information being directed to others further away. In particular, the entangled particles are linked in such a way that the action of one openly affects the others, even if they're parted over huge distances.  Albert Einstein himself called this 'spooky action at a distance.'  Earlier studies have revealed atoms teleporting through a room, and light being teleported through the Danube River in Austria. Last year, physicists at the University of Geneva achieved teleportation by teleporting the quantum state of a photon to a crystal over 25 km (15 miles) of optical fiber.

The experiment broke the previous record of 6km (4miles) achieved 10 years ago by the same group. Once researchers have effectively teleported molecules, Dr. Kaku considers it as the next step will be to send photons to a lunar base before testing with bigger objects, animals and ultimately humans.

During a new Big Think interview, Dr Kaku said; “In the coming years we do expect to be able to teleport molecules, maybe water and carbon dioxide. After that, who knows? Maybe even DNA.” Though, critics have debated that there are way too many atoms in the human body to interpret into physical data, then teleport and then reposition in order.

There is also the dispute that in order to transport a living object, it would have to commendably die and come back to life when the atoms are shattered down and reconstructed.

Dr. Kaku said that although teleportation is actually possible, it does come with a set of decent problems that would need to be solved.