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First Quantum Computing Gate on a Chip
An anonymous reader writes "After recent success in using quantum computing for superconducting qubits, researchers from Delft have formed the first Controlled-NOT quantum gate. 'A team has demonstrated a key ingredient of such a computer by using one superconducting loop to control the information stored on a second. Combined with other recent advances, the result may pave the way for devices of double the size in the next year or two--closer to what other quantum computing candidates have achieved, says physicist Hans Mooij of the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. Unlike today's computers, which process information in the form of 0s and 1s, a quantum computer would achieve new levels of power by turning bits into fuzzy quantum things called qubits (pronounced cue-bits) that are 0 and 1 simultaneously. In theory, quantum computers would allow hackers to crack today's toughest coded messages and researchers to better simulate molecules for designing new drugs and materials.'"
I know grammar has been taking a hit in society as of late, but now even our computers are blatantly spewing out double negatives?
We're not in for an unrough ride, gentlemen.
I find it interesting that the first electronic computing gates devised were the AND/OR gates, using basic diode logic. Quantum computing research develops the NOT gate first. I think this has something to do with the esoteric nature of quantum computing. AND/OR gates require two inputs to change to a single value, where NOT is merely an inverter. The idea of entanglement makes the inversion process a likely first step in quantum research.
For those wondering why this is important, the first true electronic gates were invented in the early 1920's. This predates point-contact transistors by about 20 years, invented in 1947. 60 years later, here we are with transistor computing in every aspect of our lives.
At the rate quantum computing is advancing, I think we can expect to see quantum transistors (in the lab, at least) by 2020. A true useful quantum computer may be available less than 50 years from now. Hopefully by then someone will pick up the slack and have the Linux kernel ported to the Q-CPU architecture!
khasim (12/9/06): In a blind taste test, more people preferred Coke over the Pepsi that I had previously pissed in.
Is this newsworthy? Wait until they can make a full adder, on a chip. Then I'll be impressed.
Not Jokes:
It's a Quantum Gate.... NOT!
games journalism blog
Sound a lot like Tribbles to me.
but how can they test it when the output is always either 0, meh, pfft or 1?
They whose government reduces their essential liberties for temporary security, receive neither liberty nor security.
I'm no quantum theory expert by a very long shot, but it was my understanding that there are 32 quantum states of electrons, not just on/off (1/0) like in the binary computer world. So, if we now have a quantum NOT gate, doesn't that mean there are 32 possible states of the NOT gate? Also, according to the article the CNOT gates they created can be both 0 and 1 simultaneously. In my mind this would cause errors and actually stop the flow of information instead of speeding it up.
Someone with some understanding of this stuff please elaborate, before my head asplodes.
In theory, quantum computers would allow hackers to crack today's toughest coded messages.
That's an overstatement. A quantum computer will not suddendly magically crack the strongest codes. Yes, certain algorithms designed for quantum computers, like Grover's algorithm, will reduce the time needed to find the key of a symmetrical cipher with about half the number of bits in the key. However, given for example a 256-bit key you would still have ~2^128 keys to check and afaik 2^128 still takes quite sometime to crack....
They're opening the quantum gates now? They're insane! Who knows what might pour out of them... I hope they're at least doing it on the moon.
The future of the human race is up to one lone marine now. Thanks a lot, scientists.
Dude you're getting a Delft!
Can anyone remember the name of that assembler that only had the 'not' operator? Maybe it's time for a port :)
...the first Controlled-NOT quantum gate... a quantum computer would achieve new levels of power by turning bits into fuzzy quantum things called qubits (pronounced cue-bits) that are 0 and 1 simultaneously. 0 and 1 simultaneously, through a NOT gate... becomes 1 and 0 simultaneously? Sounds useful.> the result may pave the way for devices of double the size in the next year or two
Well, at the current rate of progress, we might see a Quantum Pentium III in about 26-52 years, depending on whether its "next year" or "two". I might be dead of old age by then.
At home you will use these for ever more sophisticated rendering of artificially intelligent virtual reality porn.
At work it will be more useful in the advanced simulation of a mechanical process for imprinting letter glyphs on sheets of wood fiber.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
"Mooij you're gettin' a Delft!"
but does it run linux?
http://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
It's a gate, on a chip.
If a qubit is both 0 and 1 at the same time, what is the point of inversing it? Would it then be 1 and 0 at the same time?
I've never really understand why they started calling them qubits.
A 'bit' is simply shorthand for "binary digit". Quantum digits, however, aren't binary, since they can represent much more than a simple 0 or 1. By adding the 'Qu-' to the term, we are essentially calling them "Quantum Binary Digits," which is in itself an oxymoron.
I understand that it's just supposed to be a nickname, but I think if we have the power to make up words to represent these "fuzzy" quantum digits, that "quigit" (like 'widget' with a K tacked on front) would be both more accurate and more fun to say.
(comment 2):"How come Delft U has been able to perform a CNOT with two qubits using superconducting technology? I thought Rose/D-wave claimed it was extremely difficult to do discrete quantum gates with superconducting technology. What are the present & future limitations of the Delft "quantum computer?"
Rose IGNORED the question. The quantum computer built by D-Wave is an adiabatic computer (which is an analog computer), whereas the Delft people have built a discrete gate quantum computer. Does the Delft computer make D-Wave's computer obsolete?
I don't know if it is insightful or funny, but I hope they mod you up.
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My image-word for this post is: redneck.
on whether someone is observing (or not, which is not and in negative logic).
"National Security is the chief cause of national insecurity." - Celine's First Law
Dangit, and I'm having enough trouble in computer science as it is, without all this fuzzy simultaneous 0/1 nonsense.
Hmm, seems like they've successfully performed a NOT on Moore's law.
Stop! Dremel time!
Transistors are capable of more than on and off -- they can handle many intermediate stages of charge (fundamentally low, medium, high), which computing applications do not currently exploit. Why not add a third state by using technology that already exists? What are the benefits of quantum computing over the existing versatility of transistors?
by turning bits into fuzzy quantum things called qubits (pronounced cue-bits) that are 0 and 1 simultaneously
Sounds like any ol' woman to me, nothing to worry about, we have been handling it for centuries.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
You'd never know if an article was a dupe or not.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
This is awesome no it's not!
Having taken a class on quantum computing last semester I would really like to add in some facts here. First to say qbits are both 1 and 0 at the same time is not entirely clear. Qbits are represented by arrays of length 2. These can be either [1,0] or [0,1]. Where the confusion occurs is when these are a superposition of the two, which means basically means that there is a probability that the result would be one of the two. What results from this is knowing the result most of the times, but sometimes being uncertain. For the uncertain cases there are ways to use the probabilities where in almost all cases only the more probable case will result. Also it is not completely correct to say we have no idea of how these will work. We have a pretty damn good idea, we just have not tested it yet. In fact, most of quantum computing is just simple linear algebra, as the qbits can be represented as arrays and the gates that control them can simply be represented by 2 by 2 matrices. Obviously this is only the basics of it, not touching on entanglement or any algorithms(which can all be represented by multiplying matrices). Anyway I did a pretty bad job of explaining all that, but the point is that this is a big deal and we are way ahead of understanding how these things should work in the future over understanding how to make a machine that will make them work.
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v447/n7146/ab s/nature05896.html
I want to log into that machine and run some quantum Perl scripts on it. Nothing like an existing library of code to kickstart a new architecture.
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make install -not war
How does a quantum NOT gate work exactly? Normal NOT gates make zeroes into ones and visa versa. So this makes something from a simultaneous one and zero into a simultaneous zero and one?! How does this even help perform calculations? How do you use that info? *Not zero or one, but both? WTH?* Sorry if this is an obvious question, Discrete mathematics isn't in the curriculum for aerospace engineering. Does this do tons of simple calculations very fast? If not, I don't see as much of an application in it. Maybe if it could do some higher level calculus *in hardware* then it has real value.
Last Post!
If I were to make a creative leap I would say, something that can be utilised which has two binary states at one time could somehow turn in to something that could result in erroneous random but recorded switching which then could in turn develop into an evoloving set of data that could potentially become self aware.
Or it could just spit out junk.
Either way my vote is that it should be called "Deep Thought".
-JB
"I love deadlines. I love the "whooshing" sound they make as they pass by." - Douglas Adams.
IAMAQP (I am not a quantum physicist) but the theory I read explains a system gaining processing power from shared computing of a single processor replicated across multiple realities. Each qubit is a calculated answer by a machine in one reality and the culmination of those answers assumedly gives you the correct response. David Deutsch wrote a book on this called "The Fabric of Reality" that works through the concept of a basic Turing machine - where computers all come from - and how this can be re-worked into a quantum processor.
There's a lot more math to it than that, but the idea is a simpler approximation formula replicated infinitely across realities gives an accurate response much faster than any single reality calculating the absolute answer.
Cooler yet is that if they're actually making functional quantum gates does this mean the processor power is actually being derived from other realities? That would be awesome and totally Outer Limits material.
-Matt
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For those with access the paper can be found here (PDF). Dr.Dobb's and PhysOrg also have the story.
The NOT gate is a simple bit inverter, but the CNOT gate (CONTROLLED-NOT) has two inputs, using the 2nd bit to invert or not the first bit. The article mentions the CNOT gate, not the NOT gate. In classic digital electronics, the CNOT gate equals the XOR gate:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cnot
Cracking encryption algorithms? Sounds like the MPAA/RIAA may need to flex the DMCA yet again.
Out of modpoints but really liked a post? 1BDkF6TtmmeZ3yqXbz9yhdYVqRYnwFoXDj
If a qubit Q is both zero and one at the same time, then surely its complement !Q is also both zero and one at the same time? If you had qubits Q and R which were both 0 and 1 at the same time, then wouldn't (Q & R) be all of {0, 0, 0, 1} at the same time (so more likely 0), (Q | R) be all of {0, 1, 1, 1} at the same time (and so more likely 1), and (Q ^ R) be {0, 1, 1 and 0} at the same time (so equally likely 1 and 0)?
Just because a wave function has to collapse into one eigenstate when it is observed, doesn't necessarily mean that will collapse into the one you were hoping for! And you don't need to lock a cat in a box with a time bomb to prove that.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Next year's version of Grand Theft Auto won't run on anything else!
As always this article claims more than is reasonably true. Implementations of CNOT gates have been done with cold ion traps for many years now, with more than 90% fidelity (a bad number for implementing many gate systems, however.) If the article means to claim the first solution of the sort on a chip I think that, too, may be a bit far-reaching.
How is this a step forward, I thought we already had gates that were NOT quantum gates...
- First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then ???, then profit.
I bet the inverse of all data on a windows 98 CD would run better as an operating system than most products M$ brings out. :)
Hail the all mighty powerful quantum NOT... !!!
...that is the question
Next comes Quantum Coupled Ethernet to revolutionize communications. Quantum pair sets working to provide two point to point channels.
Within a Duo Quantum, 10GigE, or the AQ (Athlon Quantum) same difference with a hyperchannel set devoted to other chips scattered all over the world.
QCE is the "Zero Mile Solution", you heard it here on Slashdot first!
Bandwidth in long haul optical fibers will be a thing of the past, those companies long term value goes down the tube! Economics of each end drives the food chain of interconnected networks at each expensive junction melting into a lower cost anywhere possibility. Then low and behold, even your cell phone works in a mine shaft or in space 100 million miles away, with nary a cell phone tower. Oops cell tower syndicate companies now have a value equal to toast per site.
Smart phones will have more bandwidth than the little screens know what to do with.
This is our world in the next decade folks.
Remember, those who short the telecommunications economy, from cable, cell and phone with a dash of even satellite television challenged... Well now you can beat up on Wall Street ahead of those gullible institutional bankers trying to schill extra profits from an apparently revitalized set of companies. Well guess what folks, this is the last hurrah for them in a Quantum Communications world the amount of winners will be very small and the all of us get a better deal than the toll keepers to video and voice want to rain on your parade with yet another DRM scheme.
Wall Street is so damn blind to this!
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