Tag: quantum physics

Quantum Computer Startup SEEQC Unveils Digital Chip for Super Cold Temperatures

New York-based quantum computer startup SEEQC said on Wednesday it has developed a digital chip that can operate at temperatures colder than outer space so it can be used with quantum processors that are often in cryogenic chambers.

Quantum computers, based on quantum physics, have the potential one day to complete some calculations millions of times faster than the most powerful supercomputer today.

One challenge is that quantum processors with quantum bits, or qubits, often need to be stored at very cold temperatures near zero Kelvin, or -273.15 degrees Celsius. On the other hand, classical computers operate in more moderate temperatures.

But the two need to be paired as information from the quantum processors is measured in wave form and must be digitised into ones and zeros for classical computers used to control and access the qubits.

Today wires connect the quantum processor in the freezing chamber to classical computers in room temperature, but the temperature change can slow the speed and cause other issues. SEEQC has also built its quantum computer this way and is now trying to modify it with its new chips.

“If you’re trying to build a data center, if that’s your goal, then it’s not enough to take these kind of early prototype designs and try to scale them on a brute force manner,” John Levy, co-founder and CEO of SEEQC, told Reuters.

The first chip it unveiled Wednesday sits directly under the quantum processor and controls the qubits, and reads out the results.

At least two other chips still under development will be in a slightly warmer part of the cryogenic chamber. These could further process information needed for quantum computing.

The technology could make it easier to build more powerful quantum computers as each cryogenic chamber would be able to support a larger number of qubits, said Levy. Today’s superconducting quantum computers have hundreds of qubits, but some estimate thousands, or even a million could be needed to create a quantum computer to run useful algorithms.

The SEEQC digital chips are made at SEEQC’s fabrication facility in Elmsford using silicon wafers but do not use transistors, Levy said.

SEEQC was founded in 2018 and has raised a total of $30 million from investors including Merck’s M Ventures and LG Tech Ventures.

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NASA’s International Space Station Lab Develops Ultracold Atomic Bubbles, Paves New Way for Quantum Research

NASA’s Cold Atom Lab aboard International Space Station (ISS) has come up with a discovery that can give a new direction to quantum research. In this lab, researchers have experimented with gas to form an exotic material. Gas, when cooled to nearly absolute zero (minus 459 degrees Fahrenheit, or minus 273 degrees Celsius) formed small, round blobs. An article published on NASA’s website compares the formation of these bubbles to that of egg yolks with thin eggshells. The ultracold atomic gas bubbles form a hollow sphere. The largest bubbles are about 1 millimetre in diameter and 1 micron thick (that’s one-thousandth of a millimetre or 0.00004 inches).

NASA‘s Cold Atom Lab is the first-ever quantum physics facility at the International Space Station. The experiment did not require any assistance from astronauts. The lab is a tightly sealed vacuum chamber about the size of a minifridge. Researchers, at Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), remotely controlled the magnetic fields in the lab to manipulate the gas to form different shapes. For the experiment, scientists took atom samples and cooled them to “within a millionth of a degree above absolute zero.”

The research was published in the journal Nature on May 18.

David Aveline, lead author of the study and a member of the Cold Atom Lab science team at NASA’s JPL in Southern California, noted, “These are not like your average soap bubbles. Nothing that we know of in nature gets as cold as the atomic gases produced in Cold Atom Lab. So we start with this very unique gas and study how it behaves when shaped into fundamentally different geometries. And, historically, when a material is manipulated in this way, very interesting physics can emerge, as well as new applications.”

Nathan Lundblad, the principal investigator of the new study, said, “Some theoretical work suggests that if we work with one of these bubbles that is in the BEC state, we might be able to form vortices – basically, little whirlpools – in the quantum material.” Lundblad is a professor of physics at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine. The new study will help researchers to further delve into the quantum nature of matter.

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