A team led by Yale University researchers has successfully implemented simple algorithms using a quantum processor based on microwave solid-state technology--similar to that found in computers and cell phones. The new processor is far from conventional, however, in that it uses the potent power of quantum mechanics to bring the dream of quantum computing a small but significant step closer to reality.

Another step towards quantum computing – the Holy Grail of data processing and storage – was achieved when an international team of scientists that included researchers with the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) were able to successfully store and retrieve information using the nucleus of an atom.

An international team of scientists has performed the ultimate miniaturisation of computer memory: storing information inside the nucleus of an atom. This breakthrough is a key step in bringing to life a quantum computer - a device based on the fundamental theory of quantum mechanics which could crack problems unsolvable by current technology.

Current technology enables the building of electrical circuits similar to those we use at home but reduced thousands of times in size to a micrometric scale of thousandths of a millimetre. When these circuits are built of superconductor materials and at near-absolute zero cryogenic temperatures, the world of everyday physics is left behind and the amazing world of quantum physics is entered.

Scientists at Florida State University’s National High Magnetic Field Laboratory and the university’s Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry have introduced a new material that could be to computers of the future what silicon is to the computers of today.

RIKEN, NEC Corporation, and JST (“Japan Science and Technology Agency”) have successfully demonstrated a laser emission from one artificial atom by coupling superconducting quantum bits (“qubits”) to a resonator. The lasing effect was achieved by an extremely simple system - a single “atom” coupled to a resonator - and represents a world first in the use of a superconducting qubit as an artificial atom to generate lasing photons.

It might seem like an esoteric achievement of interest to only a handful of computer scientists, but the advent of quantum computers that can run a routine called Shor’s algorithm could have profound consequences. It means the most dangerous threat posed by quantum computing - the ability to break the codes that protect our banking, business and e-commerce data - is now a step nearer reality.

Researchers at Delft University of Technology have succeeded in carrying out calculations with two quantum bits, the building blocks of a possible future quantum computer. The Delft researchers are publishing an article about this important step towards a workable quantum computer in this week's issue of Nature.