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In recent years, the Austrian physicist Anton Zeilinger has bounced entangled photons off orbiting satellites and made 60-atom fullerene molecules exist in quantum superposition--essentially, as a smear of all their possible positions and energy states across local space-time. Now he hopes to try the same stunt with bacteria hundreds of times larger.

Meanwhile, Hans Mooij of the Delft University of Technology, with Seth Lloyd, who directs MIT's Center for Extreme Quantum Information Theory, has created quantum states (which occur when particles or systems of particles are superpositioned) on scales far above the quantum level by constructing a superconducting loop, visible to the human eye, that carries a supercurrent whose electrons run simultaneously clockwise and counterclockwise, thereby serving as a quantum computing circuit.

But before technologies like quantum communications, computing, and metrology can realize their potential--a quantum Internet and uncounterfeitable money are two interesting possibilities--quantum networks must be able to transmit and store data. The quantum optics group at the California Institute of Technology has been working toward this goal.

Source: http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/23198/?a=f