Quantum computation using impurities of a diamond; Research

Researchers have done quantum computation on a little piece of diamond.

[hana-code-insert name=’StumbleUpon’ /][hana-code-insert name=’Reddit’ /]This research has been published online in the April 4 issue of the journal Nature.

Before going further in depth, I want you to know a little about “Quantum bits”. These are also known as “Qubits”. They are the information carriers in quantum computation. One bit, which is normally used in present computers, has the ability to express zero or one at a time, i.e. one binary digit at a time, but qubits have the property of “superposition”, i.e. they can express zero and one at a time.

In the present research, scientists have used the impurities present in the diamond as the qubits. These impurities are the nitrogen nucleus and the free electron. They worked as two separate qubits and scientists used them to perform calculation on a 1mm thick diamond, which you can see in the picture above.

This research has added benefits in quantum computation as it is made on a solid matrix and it is free from “decoherence” i.e. noise that causes disturbance in the normal functioning of computer.

This research has been funded by National Science Foundation and the U.S. Army Research Office’s Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative.

Reference:

T. van der Sar, Z. H. Wang, M. S. Blok, H. Bernien, T. H. Taminiau, D. M. Toyli, D. A. Lidar, D. D. Awschalom, R. Hanson & V. V. Dobrovitski, (2012). Decoherence-protected quantum gates for a hybrid solid-state spin register. Nature, doi:10.1038/nature10900

Further Reading:

University of Southern California