Monday, January 16, 2006

Quantum Microchips


Scientists at the University of Michigan have recently constructed the first quantum microchip by utilizing individual ions to act in the place of transistors. By isolating an ion, scientists can manipulate the spin of its free electron to alter its quantum state. A quantum bit, or qubit can take the state of an up-spin, a down-spin, or both states simultaneously. By being able to occupy two states simultaneously, a qubit has an enormous advantage over the binary bit of classical computing. This is because a quantum computer would be able to test every possible combination of values simultaneously. A computer with 100 qubits would be able to test 2^100 solutions. Therefore computational power of a quantum computer grows expontential with each qubit added to the system.

Spin Doctors Create Quantum Chip