Chinese-South African team establishes longest quantum communication link: What's special?
21 Mar 2025

In a major breakthrough in quantum communication, a joint team from China and South Africa has established the world's longest quantum communication link.

They accomplished the feat using an inexpensive microsatellite and portable ground stations.

The pioneering work was described in a recent article in Nature, a peer-reviewed scientific journal.

The researchers used China's Jinan-1 quantum microsatellite to link Stellenbosch University in South Africa with a base in Beijing, operated by University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) researchers.

Quantum microsatellite facilitates long-distance image transmission
Technological breakthrough

The quantum microsatellite was integral to the successful transmission of two images over a staggering distance of 12,900km. One of the images was of China's Great Wall while the other one was of Stellenbosch campus.

The research team noted in their paper that they have developed a quantum microsatellite that can perform space-to-ground quantum key distribution with portable ground stations.

This is a major leap in quantum communication technology.

Future plans for a global-scale quantum network
Expansion plans

The research team has ambitious plans for the future, as they noted in their paper.

They want to launch several microsatellites and set up a wide-spanning network of optical ground stations. This would be a step toward achieving a practical quantum constellation.

Such a global-scale quantum network, the team hopes, would have revolutionary communication, computing, and sensing capabilities.