An international research team led by a quantum information scientist at the University of York built a prototype quantum radar that has the potential to detect objects that are invisible to conventional systems.
This new breed of radar is a hybrid system which uses quantum correlation between microwave and optical beams to detect the objects that has low reflectivity such as cancer cells or aircraft. The radar operates at lower energies compared to the conventional systems and therefore it has a long-term potential for numerous applications in biomedicine including non-invasive NMR scans.
A special converter—a double-cavity device that couples the microwave beam to an optical beam using a nanomechanical oscillator—was the key to the new system which was found by the research team led by Dr. Stefano Pirandola, of the university’s Department of Computer Science and the York Centre for Quantum Technologies.
Quantum radars exploit quantum entanglement to enhance their sensitivity to detect even small signal reflections from very noisy regions, whereas the classical radar systems emits a microwave to scan a region of space and any target object present there would reflect the signal to the source, but the objects with low reflectivity immersed in regions with high background noise are very difficult to spot. Dr. Pirandola said that while quantum radars were some way off, they would have superior performance especially at the low-photon regime.
“Our method could be used to develop non-invasive NMR spectroscopy of fragile proteins and nucleic acids. In medicine, these techniques could potentially be applied to magnetic resonance imaging, with the aim of reducing the radiation dose absorbed by patients.” he added.
In coming future, this scheme could be operated at short distances to detect the presence of defects in biological samples or human tissues in a completely non-invasive fashion, thanks to the use of a low number of quantum-correlated photons.
Source:R&D Magazine
This new breed of radar is a hybrid system which uses quantum correlation between microwave and optical beams to detect the objects that has low reflectivity such as cancer cells or aircraft. The radar operates at lower energies compared to the conventional systems and therefore it has a long-term potential for numerous applications in biomedicine including non-invasive NMR scans.A special converter—a double-cavity device that couples the microwave beam to an optical beam using a nanomechanical oscillator—was the key to the new system which was found by the research team led by Dr. Stefano Pirandola, of the university’s Department of Computer Science and the York Centre for Quantum Technologies.
Quantum radars exploit quantum entanglement to enhance their sensitivity to detect even small signal reflections from very noisy regions, whereas the classical radar systems emits a microwave to scan a region of space and any target object present there would reflect the signal to the source, but the objects with low reflectivity immersed in regions with high background noise are very difficult to spot. Dr. Pirandola said that while quantum radars were some way off, they would have superior performance especially at the low-photon regime.
“Our method could be used to develop non-invasive NMR spectroscopy of fragile proteins and nucleic acids. In medicine, these techniques could potentially be applied to magnetic resonance imaging, with the aim of reducing the radiation dose absorbed by patients.” he added.
In coming future, this scheme could be operated at short distances to detect the presence of defects in biological samples or human tissues in a completely non-invasive fashion, thanks to the use of a low number of quantum-correlated photons.
Source:R&D Magazine
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