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A team from the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has conducted a series of experiments to gain a better understanding of quantum mechanics and pursue advances in quantum networking and quantum computing, which could lead to practical applications in cybersecurity and other areas.

ORNL quantum researchers Joseph Lukens, Pavel Lougovski, Brian Williams, and Nicholas Peters—along with collaborators from Purdue University and the Technological University of Pereira in Colombia—summarized results from several of their recent academic papers in a special issue of the Optical Society’s Optics & Photonics News, which showcased some of the most significant results from optics-related research in 2019. Their entry was one of 30 selected for publication from a pool of 91.

Conventional computer “bits” have a value of either 0 or 1, but quantum bits, called “qubits,” can exist in a superposition of quantum states labeled 0 and 1. This ability makes quantum systems promising for transmitting, processing, storing, and encrypting vast amounts of information at unprecedented speeds.

IBM and the University of Tokyo will form the Japan – IBM Quantum Partnership, a broad national partnership framework in which other universities, industry, and government can engage. The partnership will have three tracks of engagement: one focused on the development of quantum applications with industry; another on quantum computing system technology development; and the third focused on advancing the state of quantum science and education.

Under the agreement, an IBM Q System One, owned and operated by IBM, will be installed in an IBM facility in Japan. It will be the first installation of its kind in the region and only the third in the world following the United States and Germany. The Q System One will be used to advance research in quantum algorithms, applications and software, with the goal of developing the first practical applications of quantum computing.

IBM and the University of Tokyo will also create a first-of-a-kind quantum system technology center for the development of hardware components and technologies that will be used in next generation quantum computers. The center will include a laboratory facility to develop and test novel hardware components for quantum computing, including advanced cryogenic and microwave test capabilities.

Editor’s note: Geoff Woollacott is Senior Strategy Consultant and Principal Analyst at Technology Business Research. IBM and NC State are coperating on quantum computing development.

HAMPTON, N.H. – JPMorgan Chase announced on Jan. 22 the hiring of Marco Pistoia from IBM. A 24-year IBM employee with numerous patents to his credit, Pistoia most recently led an IBM team responsible for quantum computing algorithms. Algorithm development will be key to developing soundly engineered quantum computing systems that can deliver the business outcomes enterprises seek at a faster and more accurate pace than current classical computing systems.

A senior hire into a flagship enterprise in the financial services industry is the proverbial canary in the coal mine, as TBR believes such actions suggest our prediction of quantum achieving economic advantage by 2021 remains on target. Quantum executives discuss the three pillars of quantum commercialization as being:

Lasers and microwaves used to study crystal spinning at 200,000 rpm.

For decades, physicists have struggled to create a quantum theory of gravity. Now an approach that dates to the 1970s is attracting newfound attention.

Echoes in gravitational wave signals suggest that the event horizon of a black hole may be more complicated than scientists currently think.

Research from the University of Waterloo reports the first tentative detection of these echoes, caused by a microscopic quantum “fuzz” that surrounds newly formed black holes.

Gravitational waves are ripples in the fabric of space-time, caused by the collision of massive, compact objects in space, such as black holes or neutron stars.

Something to look forward to: Some of the biggest problems that need solving in the enterprise world require sifting through vast amounts of data and finding the best possible solution given a number of factors and requirements, some of which are at.

Quantum physics now states that matter is merely an illusion and that everything is energy at a different frequency in vibratory motion. This is something that science has only started to take seriously since the turn of the last century. However, this was something Hermes Trismegistus (the founder of the hermetic teachings) taught as one of the 7 principles of existence and recorded history of his teachings have dated back as far as the 1st century AD.

These teachings go further than modern science has the ability to quantify, but science is slowly catching up with many of the ideas shared. Here is a section on vibration which has been taken from the book The Kybalion is an introduction into the teachings of occult hermeticism and was derived from the ancient teachings of Hermes Trismegistus.

Nothing rests; everything moves; everything.

The research, which appears this week in Science, examined the electronic and magnetic behavior of a “strange metal” compound of ytterbium, rhodium and silicon as it both neared and passed through a critical transition at the boundary between two well-studied quantum phases.

The study at Rice University and Vienna University of Technology (TU Wien) provides the strongest direct evidence to date of entanglement’s role in bringing about quantum criticality, said study co-author Qimiao Si of Rice.

“When we think about quantum entanglement, we think about small things,” Si said. “We don’t associate it with macroscopic objects. But at a quantum critical point, things are so collective that we have this chance to see the effects of entanglement, even in a metallic film that contains billions of billions of quantum mechanical objects.”