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Optomechanics

Hardware for a quantum network

Nature volume 507, pages 45–46 (2014)Cite this article

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An optomechanical device has been designed that converts radio-frequency electrical signals into laser light. The system could allow computers to share data in a future quantum network based on optical fibres. See Letter p.81

Quantum computers are coming. In fact, computing technologies that are based on the peculiar laws of quantum physics are already a reality in some niche applications. These machines perform computations by manipulating quantum bits (qubits) of information, instead of classical bits. Because qubits can be 'zero' or 'one' as well as both of these values at the same time, they can encode more information than their classical analogues. Therefore, in certain applications, a quantum computer could calculate a multitude of parallel tasks much faster than supercomputers will ever be able to do. This 'qubit crunching' potential aside, quantum computers will eventually need to communicate with one another through a network. On page 81 of this issue, Bagci et al.1 describe how they have created a device that brings this goal a step closer.

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References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Mika A. Sillanpää is in the Department of Applied Physics, Aalto University, FI-00076 Aalto, Finland.,

    Mika A. Sillanpää

  2. Pertti J. Hakonen is in the O. V. Lounasmaa Laboratory, Aalto University.,

    Pertti J. Hakonen

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  1. Mika A. Sillanpää
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  2. Pertti J. Hakonen
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Correspondence to Mika A. Sillanpää.

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Sillanpää, M., Hakonen, P. Hardware for a quantum network. Nature 507, 45–46 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/507045a

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