Neutrino's used to send message! :

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/03/120314143146.htm

This is the start of a new way to send wireless messages, of course right now our technology requires a few thousand tons of stuff to do the job but it will only be a matter of time before it becomes a viable alternative to RF and Optical communications.

It goes to our talk about SETI, one reason why we don't hear anything is they advance past the need for RF or optics as a communications medium.

Originally posted by sonhouse
This is the start of a new way to send wireless messages, of course right now our technology requires a few thousand tons of stuff to do the job but it will only be a matter of time before it becomes a viable alternative to RF and Optical communications.

I doubt that it will ever be viable as a replacement technology. Probably only for niche purposes.
To use it for transmission without the thousands of tons, one would need to produce a lot more neutrinos. Then one would have to aim the accurately at the target, or there would be a problem with noise. We don't have the luxury of different wavelengths as we do with light or RF, so noise would be a bigger problem. If you are transmitting from continent to continent, then accurate aiming would become essential, but simple things like earth quakes and continental drift would start to cause issues.
In addition to this, I expect that we will have optical links worldwide exceeding requirements long before neutrino technology becomes usable and there will be no need to start replacing them.

Originally posted by twhitehead
I doubt that it will ever be viable as a replacement technology. Probably only for niche purposes.
To use it for transmission without the thousands of tons, one would need to produce a lot more neutrinos. Then one would have to aim the accurately at the target, or there would be a problem with noise. We don't have the luxury of different wavelengths as w ...[text shortened]... ng before neutrino technology becomes usable and there will be no need to start replacing them.

Well, the wavelength issue is valid but it would not lead to noise it would lead to limited bandwidth, more of an issue of how many neutrino's can you detect in one second kind of thing. As it stands I don't think we can aim or concentrate them very well, even the guys at Cern are making a neutrino beam that is probably at least 90 degrees wide, you know, where they did the experiment that supposedly saw neutrino's going faster than the speed of light? First they generate a particle beam that hits some kind of target and that produces a flash of neutrino's, not sure how many times the beam can hit the target before it disintegrates but that generates a nice beam of neutrinos alright. It's just that 50,000 tons of equipment needed that kills you.

But that is the 21st century, maybe in century 22 things will be different.
One thing, if you had a reliable neutrino communications going say, through the earth from one side to the other, through 8000 miles of solid rock, the speed of transmission would be significantly faster, since at something very close to c, you are going through the diameter of Earth but radio waves are going to have to go at least through the circumference and then some counting satellite bounces or radio wave bounces off the ionosphere so messages would definitely get there faster than the speed of light around the Earth, some three times faster in fact. Don't know if that would ever even be important but there it is.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Well, the wavelength issue is valid but it would not lead to noise it would lead to limited bandwidth,

It would lead to noise, because if your beam is not accurate, then it also sends neutrinos to other peoples detectors, but because of the lack of bandwidth they cannot separate your signal from theirs. I guess if the detector is also directional, there is room for improvement.

The reason for the current detectors being very large, is that neutrinos react very rarely (which is why they can be sent through the earth). However, if you make the detector smaller, you need more neutrinos. The question then, is do you need exponentially more? If you double your neutrino beam, are there double the number of detections on the other side of the earth? I suspect not, as there would be more interactions during the passage through the earth.

Originally posted by twhitehead
It would lead to noise, because if your beam is not accurate, then it also sends neutrinos to other peoples detectors, but because of the lack of bandwidth they cannot separate your signal from theirs. I guess if the detector is also directional, there is room for improvement.

The reason for the current detectors being very large, is that neutrinos rea ...[text shortened]... earth? I suspect not, as there would be more interactions during the passage through the earth.

Actually, that reaction to objects in the earth is one reason they send neutrinos down into the Earth, to get information as to conditions deep underground, thousands of miles deep.

There will have to be significant advances in both theory and technology to get anything useful as a communications system for sure.

Think 23rd century🙂

Originally posted by sonhouse
Actually, that reaction to objects in the earth is one reason they send neutrinos down into the Earth, to get information as to conditions deep underground, thousands of miles deep.

There will have to be significant advances in both theory and technology to get anything useful as a communications system for sure.

Think 23rd century🙂

An update on the neutrino comm: The bit rate: 10 seconds per bit! Not very speedy!