Australian researchers make quantum computing breakthrough - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: EEVblog
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 02:17:40 am
content: This is pretty huge:http://www.smh.com.au/technology/sci-tech/australian-researchers-make-quantum-computing-breakthrough-paving-way-for-worldfirst-chip-20151005-gk1bov.html

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 02:33:23 am
content: I doubt it will scale. Optical is the future for quantum computing AFAICS (I wouldn't be surprised if it's already the present for the NSA).

author: photon
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 02:46:47 am
content: Yes, scaling is the issue. The news article says they demo'd 2 qubits. My understanding is that you need on the order of hundreds of qubits to make a useful quantum computer. I need to read their Nature paper.

author: Mechanical Menace
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 03:46:53 am
content: After all the quantum computing breakthroughs that weren't I can't get excited, especially given Nature's history...

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 05:19:57 am
content: Fusion is just a few years away.Oh sorry, wrong subject. No similarly there.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 05:24:26 am
content: Morally bankrupt fusion researchers / quantum computers / etc. etc. etc.Tim

author: bitwelder
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 05:31:31 am
content: Quote from: EEVblog on October 06, 2015, 02:17:40 amArticle by Hannah Francis. Where did I read that name before?

author: Psi
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 05:33:05 am
content: Here, we're all cynically engineers.To many times we have been told of awesome discoveries and its gone nowhere, never again

author: TerraHertz
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 07:37:18 am
content: Quote from: Psi on October 06, 2015, 05:33:05 amYeah, where's my f*cking antigravity hoverbelt and ticket to the Moon Resort?!

author: AndyC_772
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 08:23:02 am
content: It's hard to see any genuine advance in this area not being immediately snapped up by the military, never to be heard from again.Never mind the potential commercial uses in healthcare, climate modelling and the like. If it can crack otherwise secure encryption, it'll disappear, guaranteed. May already have done many times.

author: Halcyon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 08:27:08 am
content: Quote from: AndyC_772 on October 06, 2015, 08:23:02 amThat sort of technology already exists and has been in use by a number of agencies including state Police in Australia for some time. Of course I won't tell you who, what or how. Whilst the methodology is secret, the technology isn't (well... sort of isn't)... If you have the money to spend, although you'll probably run into difficulties with suppliers refusing to sell to you.Like all things, yes, it might start off as military/government grade stuff, will soon become mainstream once something better/faster/more accurate replaces it. Think GPS, radar and even drones.

author: JuKu
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 10:41:38 am
content: Thier cubits are made out of Silicon. Why wouldn't it scale?

author: jwm_
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 11:39:19 am
content: Quote from: AndyC_772 on October 06, 2015, 08:23:02 amThere are provably quantum-safe cryptographic algorithms so that isn't really an issue. And the US government at least has realized that restricting crypto in the private sector is self defeating because an attack on the US economy and banking system can be as devestating to the country as attacks on government computers. If there were a potential way to break AES, it would be well publicized because the government would want the private sector to move off of it quickly.All the government backdoors uncovered have been specially designed to be only exploitable by them, not just due to security by obscurity, but actually mathematically provably so (up to the strength of the cryptosystem to begin with). They can not base security on having more computing power anymore like when they tried to restrict DES.Incidentally, my first place winning entry in the underhanded crypto contest was inspired by an utter facepalm i did while reading the arduino source code, I won't say which one, there are many facepalmable things in that code base and I'd hate to ruin the surprise.In any case, forget computers, this discovery is a huge thing for physics if they have figured out a good way to maintain quantum coherence in an easy and predictable way that doesn't require liquid helium, ultra high vacuums, or other exotic equipment. And I just got my cryocooler working....

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 11:56:37 am
content: QuoteFor the advancement of mankind. And Lawyers.BTW what does the quantum logic gate answer? 1 OR 1 = probably 1?

author: grumpydoc
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 12:02:44 pm
content: Quote from: NANDBlog on October 06, 2015, 11:56:37 amWho knows, after all the quantum computers can't tell you the answer without randomly killing your cat

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 12:17:55 pm
content: Quote from: AndyC_772 on October 06, 2015, 08:23:02 amI actually think these types of electronic approaches get headline news and funding as a distraction from coherent optical computing. Optical Fourier is very close to quantum Fourier, there are indications that Shor's algorithm could be implemented with purely linear optics. It's much easier to keep a split laser beam coherent than a bunch of spin states.

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 12:21:49 pm
content: Quote from: Halcyon on October 06, 2015, 08:27:08 amPolice departments keeping a secret, that seems realistic. There is no published technology which can crack 2048+ bit RSA/DH, nor the modern symmetric ciphers with reasonable key length.

author: Kjelt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 02:39:32 pm
content: They claim they can scale it to thousands of q-bits and patented it. Could be legit, lets wait and see if this is the start of skynet.

author: photon
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 05:08:56 pm
content: Quote from: JuKu on October 06, 2015, 10:41:38 amThe problem is that a qubit is entangled with all the other qubits in its register. The problem with scaling is maintaining this entanglement. Otherwise you have a classical bit which we know already scales well.

author: Kjelt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 06, 2015, 06:38:56 pm
content: we will see about the scaling, but why would they claim and patent it if it will not work?

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 02:26:44 am
content: Quote from: Kjelt on October 06, 2015, 06:38:56 pmYou're joking, right?To be fair, maybe you don't know much about our particular brand of "patenting" (not that theirs is necessarily the same again, either).Tim

author: nanofrog
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 02:27:04 am
content: Quote from: grumpydoc on October 06, 2015, 12:02:44 pmLeave the poor cat alone. Do the world some good and use a lawyer instead.

author: SL4P
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 02:48:23 am
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on October 06, 2015, 05:24:26 amMakes me think there may be an opportunity for Batteroo there?

author: LordNobady
author_rank: Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 06:38:29 am
content: Quote from: nanofrog on October 07, 2015, 02:27:04 am

author: Kjelt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 09:11:44 am
content: Quote from: T3sl4co1l on October 07, 2015, 02:26:44 amI know to patent something is cheap in the beginning and can be quite expensive the longer you keep the patent (up to 100k$).So if you patent something it better be worth while the investment otherwise it is useless.So I really think they have something here or why invest the time and money to patent it.

author: Halcyon
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 09:24:29 am
content: Quote from: Marco on October 06, 2015, 12:21:49 pmYou are correct. However where the technology fails/costs too much/is too slow, there is legislation in-place in many countries to come up with an alternative. Once again, referring to Australia, under certain circumstances, a court can compel an individual to provide certain information (such as encryption keys, passwords etc...) to law enforcement agencies. Without getting into an argument about the ethics of such law, I will say that it's not designed to prosecute those for sharing an MP3 or bullying someone on Facebook (just yet anyway). The offences that this sort of legislation is developed for; you'll probably wish the offender was shot rather than imprisoned anyway.

author: T3sl4co1l
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 10:00:53 am
content: Quote from: Kjelt on October 07, 2015, 09:11:44 am(I should add, I meant that with considerable cynicism/sarcasm..)Often, the most publicized patent cases are those where a company, who owns a portfolio of patents (typically that they had nothing to do with inventing), sues many targets indiscriminately, seeking simple settlements instead of going to court (the settlements are targetted at somewhat less than the court fees, thus making them worthwhile). The patents are typically overly broad and abstract (and presumably illegal, by our own standards of focus and purpose; yet, they were granted nonetheless), and serve not to encourage creativity in the market, but stifle it by claiming all as infringing.Not to say they're taking a similar route in this case, but it's quite reasonable to presume that this is the way high-level computing will eventually go, and having a patent which potentially gets them a hand on that stake is probably a wise move.Tim

author: Kjelt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 10:02:58 am
content: There is another danger here: reverse privacy violation.If you ever encrypted your communications / data and it was on the web , it is probably stored somewhere in a gigantic database (encrypted).When quantum computers are able to crack those encryption ciphers in hours then all these encrypted data can be decrypted.

author: jwm_
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 12:05:58 pm
content: Quote from: Kjelt on October 07, 2015, 09:11:44 amIf you are an organization that has a team of lawyers sitting on their thumbs then patents are quite cheap. At my last company they trolled the engineering lists and would encourage people to patent any random thing mentioned that sounded interesting. A project like this may generate hundreds of patents, covering every technique used in the production and development of their gates, even if they didn't invent a quantum computer, they may have invented some of the techniques that eventually will be used and be able to collect on them or trade licenses with another organization that invents other parts of the process.

author: Marco
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: October 07, 2015, 02:16:16 pm
content: Quote from: photon on October 06, 2015, 05:08:56 pmOn the other hand we can keep lasers coherent over huge path lengths and through complex optics ... coherence and entanglement are two sides of the same coin.