One way to fully realize the potential of quantum computers is to base them on both light and matter, so that information can be stored and processed, but also travel at the speed of light.
The largest hybrid particles of light and matter have been created by scientists.
One of the few places in the world where cuprous oxide can be found is in Namibia.
The crystal from the stone was polished and thin to less than a human hair and sandwiched between two mirrors to trap light, resulting in the largest polaritons ever seen.
This achievement will allow us to create a quantum simulator that can run off the rydberg polaritons, using quantum bits or qubits to store information in 0s, 1s, and multiple values.
The University of St Andrews.
Hamid Ohadi is a physicist from the University of St Andrew's in the UK.
We have taken a huge leap towards this by creating the key ingredient of it, the rydberg polaritons.
The special thing about the polaritons is that they switch from light to matter and back again. The matter side of the coin has polaritons interacting with each other.
Light particles move quickly, but don't interact with each other. Matter is able to interact. The potential of quantum computers could be unlocked by putting these two abilities together.
Managing quantum states that are not observed until they are observed is crucial. A fully functioning quantum computer built on this technology remains some way off, but we are closer than ever before to being able to put one together.
Cuprous oxide is a material that allows electrons to flow.
Excitons can be forced to couple with light particles under certain conditions. The large excitons found in cuprous oxide can be coupled with a photon within a Fabry microcavity.
It was important to create the larger Rydberg polaritons.
Sai Kiran Rajendran, a physicist from the University of St Andrews, says that purchasing the stone on eBay was easy.
Once fully capable quantum computers can be put together, the exponential improvements in computing power will allow them to tackle hugely complex calculations beyond the scope of the computers we have today.
The development of high-temperature superconducting materials and understanding more about how proteins fold could increase our ability to produce drug treatments.
The basics of the methods outlined in the new research will need to be refined further in order for these particles to be used in quantum circuits, but the team thinks their results can be improved in the future.
The results pave the way for realizing strongly interacting excitons and exploring strongly correlated phases of matter using light on a chip.
The research has been published.
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