Image: Tim Herman / Intel Corporation
Intel's quantum computing efforts are starting to show tangible results: two years after the company first unveiled its Horse Ridge cryogenic control chip, researchers have demonstrated that the technology is delivering on its original promise, and paving the way for quantum computers to become more practical.
Practicality, in effect, is not quantum devices' most remarkable trait. Quantum computers offer something that quantum computers clearly do not: the ability to tackle problems far beyond those handled by today's computers.
Traditional computer signals are represented using bits—the quantum bits in quantum computers are sometimes referred to as qubits. On conventional computers, every bit in the sequence 0, 1, 2, 3, … is taken to stand for either a 0 or a 1. But on quantum processors, maintaining identical results requires having a qubit represent values, or "qubits," simultaneously and being able to flip those values back and forth in a fraction of a second. Consequently, each qubit must be able to be both a 1 and a 0. And, most crucially as far as an engineering standpoint, each qubit must have enough space on its bit to accommodate a data file.
Enabling this delicate feat of control, quantum systems use "superposition," in which only one of two states is immediately apparent to observers. Data on one qubit can't be read until the other is flip-flopped from its resonant position, which allows the data seen for just one qubit to become viewed only for the other qubit at the next instant. Similarly, any unexpected outcomes must be resolved in time. Is one qubit leaning toward 2 or 1? Does it reach 0 or 1 and if so, how fast? According to computational stratagem, signals defined by superposition must be very fast to maintain coherence and allow them to be retreaded back in time and then authenticated.
Clacking Away
By combining these necessities with an industry-leading 114-qubit, 5-qubit, 800-well chip, Intel has found a way to revise the equation for quantum computing. Since cabinets carrying 200 quantum logic units weren't big enough to process the heavy selling and research labs (the result, between 2004 and 2008, of Aquila, Raijin, and a few other projects that garnered key funding) have actually increased volume through conglomerate acquisition, the company has been evolving its super-quantum units into modular boards so researchers can automatically integrate advanced controls and lines of customers' needs. Thanks to FPGAs and associated chips, as well as innovations in standard parallel processing nodes, to send data and instructions to an individual super-quantum processor in an offline Intel facility, they have median speeds of mind-numbing numbers: an order of magnitude quicker than today's commercial chips.
Although this results in striving to "clack away" and book results as fast
Intel's quantum computing efforts are starting to show tangible results: two years after the company first unveiled its Horse Ridge cryogenic control chip, researchers have demonstrated that the technology is delivering on its original promise, and paving the way for quantum computers to become more practical.
Practicality, in effect, is not quantum devices' most remarkable trait. Quantum computers offer something that quantum computers clearly do not: the ability to tackle problems far beyond those handled by today's computers.
Traditional computer signals are represented using bits—the quantum bits in quantum computers are sometimes referred to as qubits. On conventional computers, every bit in the sequence 0, 1, 2, 3, … is taken to stand for either a 0 or a 1. But on quantum processors, maintaining identical results requires having a qubit represent values, or "qubits," simultaneously and being able to flip those values back and forth in a fraction of a second. Consequently, each qubit must be able to be both a 1 and a 0. And, most crucially as far as an engineering standpoint, each qubit must have enough space on its bit to accommodate a data file.
Enabling this delicate feat of control, quantum systems use "superposition," in which only one of two states is immediately apparent to observers. Data on one qubit can't be read until the other is flip-flopped from its resonant position, which allows the data seen for just one qubit to become viewed only for the other qubit at the next instant. Similarly, any unexpected outcomes must be resolved in time. Is one qubit leaning toward 2 or 1? Does it reach 0 or 1 and if so, how fast? According to computational stratagem, signals defined by superposition must be very fast to maintain coherence and allow them to be retreaded back in time and then authenticated.
Clacking Away
By combining these necessities with an industry-leading 114-qubit, 5-qubit, 800-well chip, Intel has found a way to revise the equation for quantum computing. Since cabinets carrying 200 quantum logic units weren't big enough to process the heavy selling and research labs (the result, between 2004 and 2008, of Aquila, Raijin, and a few other projects that garnered key funding) have actually increased volume through conglomerate acquisition, the company has been evolving its super-quantum units into modular boards so researchers can automatically integrate advanced controls and lines of customers' needs. Thanks to FPGAs and associated chips, as well as innovations in standard parallel processing nodes, to send data and instructions to an individual super-quantum processor in an offline Intel facility, they have median speeds of mind-numbing numbers: an order of magnitude quicker than today's commercial chips.
Although this results in striving to "clack away" and book results as fast
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