Communications of the ACM
Immunizing Quantum Computers Against Errors
ETH Zurich researchers used trapped calcium ions to demonstrate a method for making quantum computers immune to errors.
Credit: Christa Fluhmann/Shutterstock
Researchers at ETH Zurich in Switzerland tapped trapped calcium ions to render quantum computers error-proof, by generating a periodic oscillatory ionic state that bypasses the usual constraints on measurement accuracy.
The ions are corralled by electric fields, and cooled by laser beams to extremely low temperatures, at which their oscillations within the fields are described by quantum mechanics as wave functions.
Said ETH Zurich's Christa Fluhmann, "We can now manipulate the oscillatory states of the ions in such a way that their position and momentum uncertainties are distributed among many periodically arranged states."
Reducing measurement uncertainty requires the calcium ion to be paired with another ion by electric forces, so the oscillatory state can be read out without being destroyed.
Said Fluhmann, "Owing to their extreme sensitivity to disturbances, those oscillatory states are a great tool for measuring tiny electric fields or other physical quantities very precisely."
From ETH Zurich
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Abstracts Copyright © 2019 SmithBucklin, Washington, DC, USA
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