Search This Supplers Products:precision machinery partsmachining partsauto partsspare parts
Quantum computing: the engine of the fourth industrial revolution
time2018/01/11
The "quantum computing power" is slowly coming.
"Quantum computing will be the engine of the fourth industrial revolution." Recently, Chinese researcher, Institute of physics, Beijing National Laboratory for condensed matter deputy director and chief scientist Ding Hong science and technology daily in an interview with reporters, like the 1947 birth of the tube triode, quantum computation or become the next generation of disruptive technologies.
What is the quantum calculation of "unidentified and persistent"?
Break through the bottleneck of traditional computing
From 1970 to 2005, the development of computers is just as predicted by Moore's law. Every 18 months, the number of components that can be accommodated on integrated circuits is about doubled, and the computing performance of computers is also doubled.
"But this trend began to slow after 2005." Ding Hong introduced that at present, the transistor has entered the nanoscale era, and Moore's law is gradually ineffective.
There are two main bottlenecks in the development of computer. First, as the volume of the transistor is shrinking, the number of components that the computer can accommodate is increasing, and the amount of heat generated is increasing. Secondly, as the volume of the device decreases, electrons will pass through the components and quantum tunneling effect, which results in the instability of the bit of the classical computer.
What is the tunneling effect? Ding Hong has made a comparison. "It's like wearing a wall. In the macro world, high jumpers can jump over by themselves if they encounter obstacles. But in the quantum world, no such skill is needed. When you encounter obstacles, you can wear it. Only, the matter itself is small enough, and the obstacles are thin enough. " He said.
The emergence of quantum computers has skillfully solved the bottleneck problem of computer development. According to Ding Hong, in principle, a quantum computer is a reversible computer and does not lose information. The classical computer is an irreversible computer, and the operation of each bit in an irreversible process will have heat loss.
"But the quantum computer does not replace the classic computer." Ding Hong says the two are different and complement each other, and their relationship is like an incandescent lamp and a laser. Incandescent lamps and lasers are luminous and relevant, but we do not use lasers instead of incandescent lamps to illuminate, and so do quantum computers.
The quantum world that subverts common sense
Quantum physics seems to be very cold, but it has already come into our lives, such as mobile phones, computers, LED and so on, which have been used in quantum physics. "Atoms, photons, and electrons are quantum." Ding Hong said that quantum is the basic unit of matter, the most basic carrier of energy. Quantum superposition and quantum entanglement are the places where quantum physics is different from the classical physics.
What is the quantum superposition? In the case of Ding Hongju, in the classical physics, from a macro point of view, the "state" of any substance is determined. For example, put a book on the table, not the front or the back. In the quantum world, books can be both positive and negative, and become an uncertain superposition.
Similarly, the electron spin has a superposition state. The spin of electrons may be upwards or downwards. Its superposition state is half up and half down, and it is uncertain.
In the past, the problem was not found until the experiment of "Schrodinger's cat" was put forward. Schrodinger proposed an experiment in which a cat was placed in a cage and a poisonous gas bottle was placed inside. There is a switch in the device, which is controlled by the spin state of the electron. If it spin up, it opens the switch and releases poison gas to kill the cat; if the spin is down, the cat is safe.
So the question is, if the electron is in the superposition state, is the cat alive? The answer is: half of the cat is alive, half is dead.
Quantum entanglement is more mysterious. Two entangled particles, regardless of distance, can affect other particles immediately by observing one of them. "Quantum entanglement is like making a wormhole in the quantum world." Speaking of how to understand quantum entanglement, Ding Hong used to compare the wormholes in the movie star trek.