Quantum Networks Advance With Entanglement Of Photons, Solid-
State Qubits Physicists demonstrate means for quantum bits to
communicate over long distances A team of Harvard physicists led
by Mikhail D. Lukin has achieved the first-ever quantum
entanglement of photons and solid-state materials. The work
marks a key advance toward practical quantum networks, as the
first experimental demonstration of a means by which solid-state
quantum bits, or "qubits," can communicate with one another over
long distances. Quantum networking applications such as long-
distance communication and distributed computing would require
the nodes that process and store quantum data in qubits to be
connected to one another by entanglement, a state where two
different atoms become indelibly linked such that one inherits
the properties of the other. "In quantum computing and quantum
communication, a big question has been whether or how it would
be possible to actually connect qubits, separated by long
distances, to one another," says Lu