Qutrits Bring Quantum Computers Closer

KentuckyFC writes "To do anything useful with quantum logic gates, you need dozens to hundreds of them, all joined together. And because of various errors and problems that creep in, that's more or less impossible with today's technology. Now an Australian group has built and tested logic gates that convert qubits into qutrits (three-level quantum states) before processing and then convert them back again. That makes them far more powerful. The group says that a quantum computer that might require 50 conventional quantum logic gates can now be built with just 9 of the new gates. What's more, the gates process photons using nothing more than standard linear optical components (abstract on the physics arxiv)."

Comments

Personal cryptography users should be disappointed

[CRCulver]

Throughout the heyday of personal encryption, when Zimmerman was maintaining PGP and Bruce Schneier's Applied Cryptography was released, we kept hearing about how it would take thousands or millions of years to crack just one PGP message. Now we hear that computers that could break these messages might be relatively just around the corner. It's got to be a real disappointment and source of worry to people who did use PGP to encode the secrets that they are desparate to hide.

Re:What it means

[lenester]

Interesting, why is base-3 more efficient than base-2?

Because 3 is closer approximation of e than 2.