Los Alamos Successfully Employs Quantum Key Distribution

["Fergie" <fergdawg () netzero net>]

Pretty cool.

[snip]

A team of Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists, in collaboration with researchers from the National Institute of 
Standards and Technology in Boulder, Colo., and Albion College, in Albion, Mich., have achieved quantum key 
distribution (QKD) at telecommunications industry wavelengths in a 50-kilometer (31 mile) optical fiber. The work could 
accelerate the development of QKD for secure communications in optical fibers at distances beyond current technological 
limits.

In research published recently in Applied Physics Letters, the team describes the use of new superconducting 
transition-edge sensors (TES) to distribute cryptographic key material at wavelengths of 1,550 nanometers through 50 
kilometers of optical fiber. TES could provide increases in range and performance over current QKD photon detection 
schemes. Unlike the single-photon sensitive avalanche photodiodes (APD) that are typically used in optical fiber QKD 
systems, TESs detect photons by measuring minute temperature increases in a superconducting material caused by the 
absorption of individual photons.

[snip]

More:
http://www.lanl.gov/news/index.php?fuseaction=home.story&story_id=7865

- ferg


--
"Fergie", a.k.a. Paul Ferguson
 Engineering Architecture for the Internet
 fergdawg () netzero net or fergdawg () sbcglobal net
 ferg's tech blog: http://fergdawg.blogspot.com/


_______________________________________________
Fun and Misc security discussion for OT posts.
https://linuxbox.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/funsec
Note: funsec is a public and open mailing list.