Happy birthday David!

for now at least, human teleportation remains the stuff of science fiction

Dear HIW,

I love your magazine and my favourite part is technology. I have a question about it too. Could we teleport, and if so how? I know it’s to do with particles, atoms, electrons and things that everything is made of. It would make my birthday the best ever if you answered. Thank you. Yours sincerely

David, age 11

Hi David

This is a really great question, and you’re right, teleportation has everything to do with atoms and particles. Scientists are currently able to teleport single particles in laboratories. Recently, this was achieved by Chinese researchers who teleported photons (particles of light) from Earth to an orbiting satellite, the furthest distance achieved so far.

This is possible because of a strange property called quantum entanglement. When two quantum particles are formed simultaneously and at the same point in space they remain linked no matter how far apart they are moved. When one such particle is measured this influences the second, and scientists can use this to effectively change one particle into another — teleporting the information about the first particle to the second.

While this works at a quantum level, the idea of being able to teleport objects or even people is much more complex. While it may not be impossible — since our bodies are essentially just a huge collection of particles — it would be incredibly difficult to achieve.

Happy birthday David, from all of the team at How It Works!