February 23, 2004

» Macroscopic quantum effects found

In the Zeilinger experiments, a carbon-70 molecule is "instantaneously located" at innumerable spots across an area 1,000 times wider than the molecule itself. (The molecule is one nanometer wide -- that is, one-millionth of a millimeter.) To grasp how weird this is, imagine a person trying to "walk at the same time through two doors that are separated by 1,000 meters," says a statement by the University of Vienna's Institute for Theoretical Physics, the Zeilinger team's home.