Quantum PC a Step Closer
 

The Register: Quantum Pentium appears on the horizon ? The Register

Boffins ditch exotic materials, build quantum gate in silicon with conventional lithography

Australian boffins have overcome one of quantum computing's big problems by building a gate comprised of two qubits in silicon, using techniques very similar to those used to manufacture whatever device you're using to read this story.

Building a quantum logic gate in silicon is a big deal because hitherto it's only been possible to build qubit-powered logic gates in exotic materials. While the world has considerable appetite for the step-change in computing power that quantum devices promise, the prospect of working with exotic materials is rather less welcome. Hence the significance of a new letter in Nature, titled “A two-qubit logic gate in silicon”, which explains how University of New South Wales boffins have been able to build cubits “using standard lithographic techniques.”

In a conventional computer, the presence or absence of an electron indicates a one or a zero. Quantum computers store information in the spin of an electron which, thanks to the weirdness of the world at quantum scale, can be in several states at once. A single electron in a quantum computer can therefore be a zero and a one at the same time, which creates the potential for parallel processing inside a chip and therefore for faster computation.

The UNSW boffins are bullish about the discovery outlined in the letter, proclaiming it represents “the final physical component needed to realise the promise of super-powerful silicon quantum computers.”

Note use of “phsyical component” as there's plenty of work to do before a quantum computer lands on your desk, complete with interfaces to peripherals, an operating system and software.

Killjoys? Us? Never: we're already excited at the prospect of one day acquiring a Quantum Pentium .

Why not just call it a Quantium.

Nice to see the use of the multi-state electron lead to the invention of a new branch of Logic arithmetic. Can't wait for the fun.

The problem with quantum computers is that they give every possible answer as a series of probabilities. Selecting the correct answer from the range is not simply a question of picking the one with the greatest probability of being right. The favourite doesn't always win in a horse race even though the pundits all predict that it should. You need a much deeper understanding of all the factors that could influence a horse race to make an accurate prediction rather than just going on past performance of the horse and jockey. Quantum computing can potentially consider all the factors simultaneously and arrive at answers that appear improbable in the absence of knowledge of all the input data.

Douglas Adams came closest to describing the issues in terms a layman might understand in the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy series of books.

The name's already taken.
Quantium