Failed to get the use of "distant" in "separate distant atoms apart "

If atoms are distant, they are already separate apart. Should it be written as "separate entangled atoms so that there will be a distance between them"? It is wordy yet the meaning is clear.
But to make it concise? Use the expression "separate distant atoms apart "? Well, it returns to its starting point.

Context:

To get around the detection loophole, physicists often use particles that are easier to keep track of than photons, such as atoms. But it is tough to separate distant atoms apart without destroying their entanglement. This opens the ‘communication loophole’: if the entangled atoms are too close together, then, in principle, measurements made on one could affect the other without violating the speed-of-light limit.

oristarA wrote:

If atoms are distant, they are already separate apart. Should it be written as "separate entangled atoms so that there will be a distance between them"? It is wordy yet the meaning is clear.
But to make it concise? Use the expression "separate distant atoms apart "? Well, it returns to its starting point.

Context:

To get around the detection loophole, physicists often use particles that are easier to keep track of than photons, such as atoms. But it is tough to separate distant atoms apart without destroying their entanglement. This opens the ‘communication loophole’: if the entangled atoms are too close together, then, in principle, measurements made on one could affect the other without violating the speed-of-light limit.

I think you're reading it wrong, although I haven't looked at the source, Oris. Think of it this way: You have a set of atoms, a good distance from each other. Now you want to take each of them apart. They're saying it's hard to do that without destroying their entanglement.

I think taking "apart" here means "splitting" each atom into subparts.

You have to make the two atoms entangled in your lab and then Jack takes one of them to London, while John takes another to New York; you sit in your office to hear them call to you: Jack tells you "I turned the atom clockwise this morning" and John tells "I did nothing at all, but my atom mysteriously turned itself counterclockwise at the exact time when Jack turned his atom."

In this case, I think separating them apart means to identify, locate and/or distinguish one from another, not to split the atom(s). Atomic fission doesn't seem to match the context. Distinguishing them requires measurement/observation of the entangled property, which destroys entanglement, as far as I know after a brief web search.

This opens the ‘communication loophole’: if the entangled atoms are too close together, then, in principle, measurements made on one could affect the other without violating the speed-of-light limit.

I think: In order to confirm entanglement, the atoms must be far enough apart so that the second measurement can be made before light has had time to travel from the first atom to the second. A minimum distance is required. However, the greater the distance, the more difficult it is to locate the specific entangled atom from among other atoms in the vicinity. So, the distance should be carefully controlled.