NIST researchers have made significant progress in developing a practical quantum computer using electrically charged atoms (ions) as quantum bits (qubits). They demonstrated sustained, reliable information processing operations on ions, overcoming previous limitations in scaling up ion-trapping technology.
The key innovations in the NIST experiment include:
1. Using two partner magnesium ions as “refrigerants” to cool beryllium ions after transport, allowing logic operations to continue without additional errors.
2. Storing data values in special states of ions resistant to unwanted alterations by stray magnetic fields.
The experiment successfully performed all recognized requirements for a large-scale ion-based quantum processor, including initializing qubits, storing data, performing logic operations, transferring information, and reading out results. The quantum processor worked with an accuracy of 94%, demonstrating that operations are insulated from errors introduced by ion transport.
While the error rate of 6% is not yet fault-tolerant, the demonstration moves ion-trap technology significantly forward on the path to a large quantum processor. The research was supported in part by the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity.
Keywords: Quantum, Computer, Ions, Logic, Qubits
