A Chinese quantum satellite has dispatched transmissions over a distance of 1,200 km, a dozen times further than the previous record, a breakthrough in a technology that could be used to deliver secure messages, state media says.
China launched the world's first quantum satellite last August, to help establish "hack proof" communications between space and the ground, state media said at the time.
The feat opens up "bright prospects" for quantum communications, said Pan Jianwei, the lead scientist of the Chinese team, Quantum Experiments at Space Scale (QUESS), according to the official Xinhua news agency.
The scientists exploited the phenomenon of quantum entanglement, in which a particle can affect a far-off twin instantly, somehow overcoming the long distance separating them, a situation termed "spooky action at a distance" by the Nobel-prize winning physicist Albert Einstein, Xinhua added.
China still lags behind the United States and Russia in space technology, although President Xi Jinping has prioritised advancing its space program, citing national security and defence.
