SPECIAL | The dream of quantum computing is closer than ever
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What is the dream of quantum computing?
Hello, and welcome to The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Wednesday, April 9, 2025, and this is a special episode of The Excerpt. Microsoft says it created a new state of matter to power quantum computers, one that's neither liquid, solid, nor gas. It's the latest major announcement in the race to achieve a new level of computing power, one that's exponentially faster by several magnitudes than traditional computers, transforming drug discovery, data encryption, and artificial intelligence. In short, helping humanity solve its most difficult scientific and environmental problems. How is this project advancing the science of quantum computing? To dive into the science and progress, we're now joined by Chetan Nayak, a technical fellow in quantum hardware at Microsoft and co-author of the study that first presented Microsoft's research in the scientific journal Nature. Thanks for joining me. Thanks for having me. Let's start with the basics here.
How is quantum computing different from classical computing?
First, what is quantum computing?
It's a great question because oftentimes people think that quantum computers are just a faster version of classical computers that are sped up by orders of magnitude, as you said. But actually, they're really a very different computing paradigm. In short, what a quantum computer aims to do is to take advantage of the underlying laws of nature, which are quantum mechanics, so that you can have what's called a qubit, replacing the basic unit of information in a class computer as a bit. It's a zero or a one. A qubit, on the other hand, like Schrodinger's cat, which could be both dead and alive at the same time, a qubit can actually be both zero and one, in a quantum superposition. So a quantum computer takes advantage of that basic fact of nature, which although that's true of everything around us, we have the luxury of kind of forgetting about that or ignoring that as we go around our daily life. This computer screen in front of me is not both here and somewhere else, it's only here. And that's because as objects get larger, their quantum effects tend to get suppressed.
But as things get small, they actually, their quantum effects tend to get accentuated. And as Moore's Law has progressed over the last decades, the transistors on chips and the density of elements on processors has gotten so high and the transistors have gotten so small that they are getting really close to that world where quantum effects become important. You could view that as potentially a disaster because you want your information to be a zero or a one. You don't want it to be both zero and one sometimes. But it turns out it's also an opportunity because there are certain problems which are really difficult to solve ordinarily that a quantum computer, if we can build one of a large enough scale and stability, would be able to do relatively easily.
What does the new state of matter mean for quantum computing?
I mentioned a new form of matter, which, of course, is huge scientific news for people who aren't scientists and maybe even for some who are. What does this mean?
Well, as you said correctly, solids, liquids and gases are different states of matter. And as you continuously change, for instance, the temperature in a solid like ice, its properties change continuously. You know, you warm it up a little bit, its density changes a little bit. But then you get to the transition point. And at that transition point, a small change in temperature leads to a huge change in its properties. And it becomes water at the melting point. And then again, at the boiling point, it becomes steam. So there are clear distinctions between the solid ice and the liquid water. There are, as it turns out, there are actually finer classifications of solids. For instance, some solids are magnetic, some solids are non-magnetic, some solids are metallic, others are insulating, some are actually superconducting, you know, which is a remarkable phenomenon that occurs when you cool down metals. They tend to actually become better metals and better conductors as we make them colder.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the dream of quantum computing?
0:03–1:10
2
How is quantum computing different from classical computing?
1:10–3:00
3
What does the new state of matter mean for quantum computing?
3:00–7:19
4
What unusual conditions are required for quantum computing?
7:19–10:10
5
How close are we to practical quantum computers?
10:10–11:29
6
How has Microsoft's quantum computing journey evolved?
11:29–13:51
Speakers
2 identifiedMore from The Excerpt
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