Part of a working quantum key distribution system.

NIST

In the realm of security research, there are always three protagonists: Alice always wants to get connected with Bob. Eve, the jealous bystander, wants to get in their way. Hence, Alice and Bob have to communicate in code.

Currently, standard encryption techniques work very well, but Alice lives in fear of Eve developing a usable quantum computer. To counter this, Alice and Bob have been sold a new quantum key distribution (QKD) system. These systems guarantee, based on the very laws of physics, that their codes will be unbreakable. Unfortunately, Eve has turned out to be as clever as the physicists who developed QKD, meaning there's a new security battleground rather than the promised security nirvana. But a new development, based on something called entanglement swapping, closes off the loopholes that allowed Eve in.

Is the key alive or dead?

QKD relies on the fundamental principles of quantum mechanics to generate a common secret key between two parties. The basic idea is that Alice generates photons with polarization

I first came across Ian Sample listening to the Guardian Science Podcast. On the podcast he comes across as a bit—okay, a lot—cynical, while still being wholeheartedly enthusiastic about science. He is especially enthusiastic about big science, and there is nothing bigger than particle physics accelerators.

In Massive: The Hunt for the God Particle, Sample tells the story of the hunt for the Higgs boson. Peter Higgs, along with a number of other physicists, developed a theoretical model that explained the masses of all known particles through an interaction with a field. This Higgs field ignores some particles, allowing them to move fast, so we measure them as having very little mass. Other particles spend a lot of time chatting with the Higgs field, slowing them down. These latter particles move very slow, so we measure them as having a large mass. Associated with every field is a particle, which, in this case, is the Higgs boson.

Sample's narrative takes the form of a detective novel, where each character has a part to play in hunting down the Higgs. Although the narrative is, thankfully, not told in a linear fashion, Sample signposts jumps from the past to the present with changes in his writing style. As he moves from the past to the present, Sample cleverly slides out from under the main detective narrative of the book and into a more newspaper-style interview format. In short, the writing is clever, light, and not weighed down by a particular choice in narrative style.

Read more on Ars Technica…

I first came across Ian Sample listening to the Guardian Science Podcast. On the podcast he comes across as a bit—okay, a lot—cynical, while still being wholeheartedly enthusiastic about science. He is especially enthusiastic about big science, and there is nothing bigger than particle physics accelerators.

In Massive: The Hunt for the God Particle, Sample tells the story of the hunt for the Higgs boson. Peter Higgs, along with a number of other physicists, developed a theoretical model that explained the masses of all known particles through an interaction with a field. This Higgs field ignores some particles, allowing them to move fast, so we measure them as having very little mass. Other particles spend a lot of time chatting with the Higgs field, slowing them down. These latter particles move very slow, so we measure them as having a large mass. Associated with every field is a particle, which, in this case, is the Higgs boson.

Sample's narrative takes the form of a detective novel, where each character has a part to play in hunting down the Higgs. Although the narrative is, thankfully, not told in a linear fashion, Sample signposts jumps from the past to the present with changes in his writing style. As he moves from the past to the present, Sample cleverly slides out from under the main detective narrative of the book and into a more newspaper-style interview format. In short, the writing is clever, light, and not weighed down by a particular choice in narrative style.

Read more on Ars Technica…