experiments, each one cleverer than the last.
In his hands, entanglement is not just a scientific oddity but an essential tool. Using photons, the basic unit of light, he demonstrated
that multiple particles could be entangled,
a key step toward practical quantum computers. He also was the first to accomplish
teleportation, in which the characteristics
of one particle are transferred to another, a
breakthrough that could lead to the creation
of unbreakable codes. A professor of physics at the University of Vienna and scientific
director of the Institute of Quantum Optics and
Quantum Information of the Austrian Academy
of Sciences, Zeilinger was awarded the first
Newton Medal, given by the British Institute of
Physics, and the 2010 Wolf Prize in Physics.
DISCOVER senior editor Eric Powell caught
up with him during a visit to New York City.
