Has NASA Developed Instantaneous Communication Technology for its Rover Program?

This is my first attept at a thread!! please feel free to give me pointers for improvement. Thanks!

My comments in white/ all quotes and paraphrase in Teal.

Anyone remember Astroengineer? Lately I’ve been obsessed by the possibility that the EnEssAy might be creating a quantum computing core facility in the form of the Utah Data Center. I vaguely remembered Astroengineer’s aborted thread and did some digging wrt the JPL quantum researchers involved with the rover missions around 2010.

What I found is rather intriguing. Meet Keith Schwab

www.kschwabresearch.com...

some paraphrased highlights below

Principal Investigator
Keith Schwab, 2009

In 2000, he left Caltech and joined the National Security Agency (NSA). His research group focused on investigating quantum effects in nano-electro-mechanical devices and applications of nanotech to atomic and quantum optics.

I wonder if he was helping them develop quantum data storage- since he was so good at setting up qcoherence of ‘large’ objects.

His group carried out position measurements that were more closer to the scale of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle than anyone else (Science 2004), measurements showing the closest approach to the quantum ground state for a mechanical oscillator (Nature 2006), and subtle quantum backaction effects which can be utilized to cool mechanical structures (Nature 2006.)

During this time, Keith and his colleagues began to formulate schemes to produce mechanical superposition states using quantum electronic devices.

-important for creating quantum coherence



Keith joined Cornell University Department of Physics April of 2006. His research focused on ways to cool mechanical structures to the quantum ground state (Nature 2010), -important for creating quantum coherence

Keith joined Caltech as an Associate Professor of Applied Physics in January 2009 and is in the process of constructing an ultra-low temperature laboratory to probe the quantum limits of measurement. With Prof. Michael Roukes (Caltech), Dr. Pierre Echternach (JPL), and Prof. Matt LaHaye (Syracuse) they produced the first measurements of a qubit coupled to a mechanical resonator (Nature 2009). This system is expected to allow quantum superposition of mechanical devices.


Here is a pretty good article. Some quoted highlights below the link

arstechnica.com...

Science‘s breakthrough of 2010: A visible quantum device
Science magazine's biggest scientific and technological breakthroughs of the …

by Matt Ford - Dec 23 2010, 11:33am EST

In order to determine if this resonator truly reaches its quantum ground state, the team connected it to a Josephson phase qubit device. According to the authors, this coupling will allow "completely quantum-coherent measurement, preserving the quantum states in the coupled system." If the device were coupled to a classical measurement system, then there would be rapid decoherence of the quantum states—you'd never be able to measure its quantum behavior.


By controlling the qubit, the researchers were able to show that they could impart a single quanta of energy—a single phonon—to the mechanical resonator and observe the exchange take place in real time. They were able to control this to such a degree that the mechanical device existed in a superposition of the ground state and single quantum state, having it actually move at two different amounts simultaneously. On the flip side, they also showed that they could use a classical excitation (microwaves) to generate a coherent response in the mechanical resonator, which excited the qubit in a manner that agreed very well with theory.

Nature, 2010. DOI: 10.1038/nature08967 (About DOIs).

the journal article:
Title
"Parametric Amplification and back-action noise squeezing by a qubit-coupled nanomechanical resonator," J. Suh, M.D. LaHaye, P. Echternach, K.C. Schwab, M.L. Roukes, Nano Lett., 10 (10), pp 3990–3994 (2010).

Link
www.kschwabresearch.com...


-Wouldn’t the effect on the qubit be instantaneous? If the resonator and the qubit can be separated in space while preserving their coherence a low power system could have been rigged to change the resonator's (on Mars) frequency while monitoring the qubit (on earth presumably) w/out collapsing either's wavefunction. Instantaneous data transmission. Maybe JPLs people figured out how to make it happen!

Is this a possible connection to instantaneous data transfer to the quantum research group (schwab and his people) that astroengineer said seemed to be taking place?


Quote from part4 astroengineer’s blog

astroengineer.wordpress.com...

His sudo access on that computer was what allowed him to find the deleted files, and what allowed him to research the account. Items in the home directory and the user’s shell history pretty conclusively showed the account was owned by someone in JPL’s Quantum Sciences and Technology Group. We now had a bizarrely intriguing who, but the why remained wholly untouched. I could barely focus on my own tasks all day. We would meet up that evening, he was going to quietly recover what he could from that directory and we’d go over his findings. I left a little early, and so did he.

Even if astroengineer was wrong (corrupted timedate thing on the rover or simply creative) and transmission and receipt only *seemed* near instantaneous- NASA and NSA were clearly liking this schwab guy to pursue any and everything related to the development of quantum data storage and/or communication. I doubt his group would have been allowed to publish this fundamental proof of concept unless some of the applications are already online and technically difficult to do- it often works that way in these kinds of labs and the nature/science paper every 3-5 yrs is like a reward to the scientists and keeps their 'open source ' careers alive.


I think Astro might have been the real deal and we maybe shouldn’t have allowed him to be run off for going slow and being skittish about giving any identifying info- after all some people have lives outside of ATS.

reply to post by sjorges2002


Have they? No. Are they and/or is someone else working on making communication faster? Yes.

They are, however, still using regular radio frequencies that still travel at the speed of light:

The amount of time it takes to transmit a signal from Mars to Earth or from Earth to Mars using the High Gain Antenna varies according to the relative positions of Earth and Mars in their orbits around the sun. At the time of the July 4th landing, it took approximately 10 minutes to transmit a signal.

NASA JPL Mars FAQ page

Star and flag. I can't add anything to the conversation, but thanks for posting this information. It's intriguing.

Can you post a link to the thread you mentioned?

reply to post by sjorges2002


I think it's a great thread starter and well done. However, I'll disagree with you and go with Occam's Razor here. Or - more specifically - I'd seriously doubt NASA's ability to maintain ~any~ secrets right now that were fresh and not long buries. Crumbling programs and bureaucracy just wouldn't fit the bill for such a development right now. Also - entirely a waste of such tech. What would the strategic or tactical benefit be for the program to justify the risk of outing the program ahead of a more specific need (e.g. command-and-control of new military systems)?

Good stuff though. Well done, -Mags

Yeah I remember astro engineer. I was intrigued bŷ his information. I was also quite appalled at the reception he received here at ats..

He seemed to just disappear from his blog..

Your little bit of investigating seems very interesting and does lend some credence to astro engineer.

His story's seemed truthful to me. One of the very few I took seriously to some extent.

reply to post by _BoneZ_


Are you 100% sure they haven't

sjorges2002
reply to post by _BoneZ_

 

Are you 100% sure they haven't

Makes me laugh when people make such statements. As if they'd be in the know!! LOL

sjorges2002
reply to post by _BoneZ_

 

Are you 100% sure they haven't

They have actually. But only in laboratory conditions, not in space.

faster than light transmisions

reply to post by Restricted


Here is the link to Astroengineer's thread.

www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread556125/pg1

reply to post by Insurrection


Thanks so much!

You raise some valid pts re command and control, but maybe it could be done under NSA's purview- schwab is one of theirs.

reply to post by DigitalResonance


It was a riveting story. I think his blog's still up. Its pretty circumstantial, but the published work does seem to be a proof of concept for what astro said he thought was going on.

You're not the only one who took his story seriously.

Best
sjorges

reply to post by VoidHawk


Ditto!!

A little good natured tongue in cheek

reply to post by intrptr


That's part of the point I was trying to make in the OP, but maybe NSA/NASA went further?

Should have read your linked article- I believe that article (its a little vague) is about using RF pulses to send light pulses with peak power in RF. The speed spoken of in the article is most likely group velocity of the pulse- which can be greater than c. These are good for data transmission not beacause they violate the speed limit but because they minimize the power requirements (among other advantages) for sending info. The article you linked has nothing to do with the possibility of instantaneous communication.

This topic has always fascinated me and I remember AstroEngineer's story as being very interesting.

I started work at Intel back in '94. During orientation we had an Engineer VP come give a fascinating talk. He told us he was working on the next big things that wouldn't be out for production until 10 or more years , like GB flash memory and low and behold - quantum computing....

Thanks for keeping the topic alive.

sjorges2002
reply to post by intrptr

 

That's part of the point I was trying to make in the OP, but maybe NSA/NASA went further?

The problem with that is wave propagation. It just doesn't move any faster. Once emitted it travels out at speed of light. Thats part of why its called a constant.

Plus, amateur radio enthusiasts would pick up a signal that arrives back on earth "before it was supposed to" and they would surely report it.

Is it possible that the rover is still on earth, in the desert somewhere? You would have near instantaneous communication.

reply to post by intrptr


The quantum correlation between coupled particles is independent of distance. A change in one is associated w/ an instantaneous, corresponding change in the other. the schwab group's paper in the OP says that they have coupled a bit of quantum info and a small mechanical oscillator, and more importantly they're able to measure aspects of their behavior without destroying coherence- meaning if the oscillator was on the mars and it was hit with microwaves- the qubit behaves differently and that difference is detectable.

the only person who could detect or be aware of any changes would be the person monitoring the coupled qubit- there is no electromagnetic radiation being transmitted.

reply to post by IndieA


VERY TRUE

But I wanna believe its on mars!!

sjorges2002
This is my first attept at a thread!! please feel free to give me pointers for improvement. Thanks!

My comments in white/ all quotes and paraphrase in Teal.

Not bad for a first thread, but ATS rules say to click the cloud icon for external content. If you also want to make it teal I guess you could do that but it's not necessary, since the cloud icon marks the text as external content in a bubble, like this (copied from your OP in correct format, without the teal, but with the cloud bubble):

During this time, Keith and his colleagues began to formulate schemes to produce mechanical superposition states using quantum electronic devices.

Regarding the topic of the thread, I really see so much confusion about this FTL communication topic, but so far nobody has demonstrated instantaneous communication. The state transfer is instantaneous but it's not a form of communication. Everyone who thinks it is seems to be a victim of wishful thinking and doesn't seem to understand the technology.

Quantum teleportation has got good applications in cryptography though. It may be the only type of crypto that NSA can't hack without someone knowing it.

reply to post by sjorges2002

What he said.

I really see so much confusion about this FTL communication topic, but so far nobody has demonstrated instantaneous communication. The state transfer is instantaneous but it's not a form of communication. Everyone who thinks it is seems to be a victim of wishful thinking and doesn't seem to understand the technology.