Quantum computers: March of the qubits

25 March 2006
Dan Cho
Magazine issue 2544

The biggest obstacle to quantum computing appears to be solved - and the machines are on their way
THEY said it couldn't be done. They said it would never be practical. They were wrong, says David Deutsch.
He is referring to the quest to build a quantum computer. This machine would exploit the weird properties of quantum mechanics to perform tasks millions of times faster than today's most powerful supercomputers. Such a device - if we can build one - would overturn the field of cryptography and revolutionise the computer industry. Yet despite this glittering prize, researchers have so far only coaxed quantum systems into solving mathematics problems that children can do in their heads.
Deutsch, a University of Oxford physicist who drew up the first blueprint for a quantum computer in 1985, thought we were still 20 years away from a useful device - until last summer. That was when theorist Simon Benjamin, also at Oxford, told him about cluster states, an approach that Benjamin believed could ...

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg18925441.500.html