Every year on holidays such as May 1st and National Day, I usually choose to stay at home, and this May 1st is no exception. Sitting at home, in a daze, running, reading, and traveling in the circle of friends, it feels good.
I read a book in the past two days, the title is very strange, "Cats, Einstein and Cryptography: Quantum Communication I Can Understand".
This cat is well-known, "Schrödinger's cat", maybe you only know its name and don't understand this cat. It doesn't matter, it's just an imaginary cat.
Einstein is like thunder, although not many people on earth understand his theory of relativity, but it does not affect his popularity.
Cryptography, this is my recent research topic. Although the theory is very mysterious, it is everywhere in life. As long as you are online, shopping, and paying, you are applying cryptography.
Quantum communication sounds very high-level. As a college student, the term quantum physics should have been heard, but like relativity, few understand.
Such strange nouns, strung together, what kind of book would it be?
A very interesting book. There are no esoteric mathematical formulas, no profound knowledge of physics, as long as you understand a little common sense in physics, to be precise, you can read this book as long as you understand the basic concepts of light waves and particles.
The author started from the debate of the century more than 100 years ago, starting from the wave-particle duality (do not know the wave-particle duality? Think carefully, did you skip class in college physics?), and then go deep into quantum mechanics step by step. With the author's profound knowledge, witty language, and god-like illustrations, everything is as smooth and smooth as Dove. For the anecdotes and anecdotes of the great gods, it is also at your fingertips.
The magic of this book is that it starts from the double-slit interference experiment, and then gets involved with Schrödinger's cat , and then the "cat" starts to stray again, putting Einstein as well. pulled in. Einstein also fainted? Quantum mechanics has made the science giant begin to doubt life. Yes, "Does God play dice?" This question haunted Einstein all his life.
Einstein's nightmare didn't stop there. Quantum theory studies the microscopic world, while Einstein's theory of relativity is the macroscopic universe. However, a result of quantum theory is the theory of super-distance, the existence of super-light speed, which directly shakes the foundation of relativity (in this universe, no matter, energy or information can exceed the speed of light in vacuum, this is the universe that has been confirmed countless times. The basic principle is also the major premise of the theory of relativity).
Everything is messed up! Hey, why did you go to the field of cryptography again?
This part of cryptography is explained in simple terms, from the beginning of the ancient Roman emperor Caesar, to the espionage war in World War II, and then to modern cryptography. Although this part of knowledge has been read in many versions, this book is the most thorough and also most vivid.
In most cryptography books, it has been mentioned that there is no absolutely secure cryptographic algorithm, as long as there is enough computing power and time, the algorithms in modern cryptography can be cracked.
But quantum theory declares that absolutely secure encrypted communication exists and is achievable. What is even more terrifying is that modern cryptography is like streaking in front of quantum computers. Because of the use of quantum computers, 1000-bit factorization does not take even 1 second. This is a disastrous future for RSA encryption, which once required enormous computing power to crack.
The only thing that can defend against quantum computers is the strongest shield: quantum encrypted communication. Quantum encrypted communication has nothing to do with computing power. It is "unconditionally safe" and is innately immune to the terrifying computing power of quantum computers.
At this point, this book ends. Some may wonder, what does this have to do with us? Check out the news below:
On August 16, 2016, "Micius", a quantum communication terminal satellite made in China, rushed out of the laboratory and flew into space under the eyes of the whole world.
The Beijing-Shanghai quantum communication trunk line was completed, and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China used quantum communication in Beijing for intra-city encrypted transmission; Alibaba Cloud's data center is using quantum communication for networking;
The European Union, which is temporarily lagging behind in terms of infrastructure, invested 1 billion euros in 2018 to implement the "Quantum Flagship" plan to open quantum communication networks across Europe.
American giants such as IBM, Google, Intel, and Honeywell are competing for "quantum supremacy". In September 2019, the quantum computer Sycamore developed by Google has exceeded 50 qubits, and completed the 10,000-year calculation result of the most powerful supercomputer on the earth in 200 seconds of quantum computing.
The real future is always better than we think.
119 years ago in the Port of St. Johns, Newfoundland, Canada, the first radio signal across the Atlantic Ocean in human history was just three faint "di, di, di" sounds, so weak that it was almost inaudible.
That day, nothing seemed to have changed.
It was not until 2 years later that the British "Times" officially used radio to send daily news to the United States;
Until 8 years later, the 35-year-old Marconi won the Nobel Prize in Physics for his invention in the field of wireless communication;
Until 11 years later, the desperate Titanic called for help by radio, and 710 passengers and crew were rescued;
Until 21 years later, the world's first wireless radio station began broadcasting;
The future has come.