

NIST Demonstrates Sustained Quantum Processing in Quantum Computers - ca98am79
http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/releases/ion_trap_computers080609.html

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sh1mmer
Can someone who knows more about this stuff than me summarise?

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pjonesdotca
One clue is here:

"Previously, scientists at NIST and elsewhere have been unable to coax any
qubit technology into performing a complete set of quantum logic operations
while transporting information without disturbances degrading the later
processes."

Definition of a qubit: "A quantum bit or qubit (pronounced /ˈkjuːbɪt/) is a
unit of quantum information." (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qubit>)

It seems that the problem was getting the initialised qubits to do anything at
all.

However, it seems that they now have a process to create a barebones
processing unit and stack (if I understand the following correctly)

"As a result, the NIST researchers have now demonstrated on a small scale all
the generally recognized requirements for a large-scale ion-based quantum
processor. Previously they could perform all of the following processes a few
at a time, but now they can perform all of them together and repeatedly: (1)
“initialize” qubits to the desired starting state (0 or 1), (2) store qubit
data in ions, (3) perform logic operations on one or two qubits, (4) transfer
information between different locations in the processor, and (5) read out
qubit results individually (0 or 1)."

