World's first holographic teleportation between nations achieved

Researchers from Western University in London, Ontario, Canada, have achieved what they believe is the world's first international holographic teleportation.

Also known as "holoportation," holographic teleportation means transporting the hologram of a person or object instantaneously to another location. On July 27th, 2022, a team from the Western Institute for Space Exploration holoported an individual from Huntsville, Alabama, to London, Ontario, and instantly holoport themselves to Huntsville.

"We had the incredible opportunity to demonstrate the first international, two-way holographic teleportation," said project leader Leap Biosystem's co-founder, Dr. Adam Sirek, a faculty member at the Schulich School of Medicine Dentistry, and Western Space.

Though this marks the first holoportation across international borders, April 2022 saw NASA holoport a doctor to the International Space Station (ISS), becoming the first "holonaut." One of the major potential applications of the technology is delivering medical care to remote areas, including the ISS.

Read more: NASA uses 'holoportation' to transport people to the space station

The process involves a special camera creating a holographic image of a subject, sending that image to a user elsewhere wearing a hololens. With the hololens, the wearer can see the subject in their environment as a hologram; if both people are wearing one, they can interact with one another as if they were both in the same place.

"It's like the best of both worlds between medicine and engineering. The applications I'm particularly looking at is facilitating physical exams that a doctor would normally conduct in an examination room," said Adam Levschuk, a medical student and project intern.

"Every time you put it on and you see the hologram appear in front of you, it's still a little bit shocking... I could reach out and virtually shake the person's hand on the other end of the line," Levschuk continued.