Optical Fiber Could Boost Power of Superconducting Quantum Computers
upstart writes in with an IRC submission for c0lo:
Optical fiber could boost power of superconducting quantum computers:
The secret to building superconducting quantum computers with massive processing power may be an ordinary telecommunications technology-optical fiber.
Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have measured and controlled a superconducting quantum bit (qubit) using light-conducting fiber instead of metal electrical wires, paving the way to packing a million qubits into a quantum computer rather than just a few thousand. The demonstration is described in the March 25 issue of Nature.
Superconducting circuits are a leading technology for making quantum computers because they are reliable and easily mass produced. But these circuits must operate at cryogenic temperatures, and schemes for wiring them to room-temperature electronics are complex and prone to overheating the qubits. A universal quantum computer, capable of solving any type of problem, is expected to need about 1 million qubits. Conventional cryostats-supercold dilution refrigerators-with metal wiring can only support thousands at the most.
Optical fiber, the backbone of telecommunications networks, has a glass or plastic core that can carry a high volume of light signals without conducting heat. But superconducting quantum computers use microwave pulses to store and process information. So the light needs to be converted precisely to microwaves.
To solve this problem, NIST researchers combined the fiber with a few other standard components that convert, convey and measure light at the level of single particles, or photons, which could then be easily converted into microwaves. The system worked as well as metal wiring and maintained the qubit's fragile quantum states.
Journal Reference:
F. Lecocq, F. Quinlan, K. Cicak, et al. Control and readout of a superconducting qubit using a photonic link, Nature (DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-03268-x)
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