Word: quantum
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What is the best way to tell a secret? Whisper it as quietly as possible. How quietly is that? Richard Hughes, 47, a researcher at the fabled Department of Energy lab in Los Alamos, N.M., and the preeminent researcher in the mind-bending field of quantum cryptography, speaks as softly as can be--in single photons of light. Combining cutting-edge encryption with the arcana of subatomic physics, Hughes designs coded messages that can be neither broken nor intercepted...
...some point they have to pass that key between them in an unencoded form. As a result, all conventional cryptosystems are theoretically vulnerable to eavesdropping. Here is the solution: embed the key in a series of single photons in such a way that the laws of quantum mechanics prevent it from being intercepted. It's perfect...
...result is an untappable line of communications. It would be easier for a potential eavesdropper to pick a single snowflake out of a blizzard than to track down a single photon in flight. What's more, like snowflakes, photons are fragile: according to the surreal logic of quantum physics, the very act of observing one alters it irrevocably...
Inventions come in all shapes and sizes. Some are as simple as purple catsup. Others push the limits of quantum physics. The real measure of an invention is not just how well it works or how impressively it is engineered, but how it changes our lives...
...prospect of another difficult read might make readers wary of taking on the University of Cambridge physicist's latest work, The Universe in a Nutshell (Bantam; 216 pages; $35). That would be a loss. Hawking takes on plenty of intimidating topics in Nutshell, including space-time geometry, quantum mechanics and the ominously titled M-theory. But he does it in a much more accessible way this time, using plenty of comprehensible analogies and no small amount of humor, often self-deprecating. Example: "Newton occupied the Lucasian chair at Cambridge that I now hold, though it wasn't electrically operated...