Blog – Page 18

Molecules haven’t been used in quantum computing, even though they have the potential to make the ultra-high-speed experimental technology even faster. Their rich internal structures were seen as too complicated, too delicate, too unpredictable to manage, so smaller particles have been used.

But a team of Harvard scientists has succeeded for the first time in trapping molecules to perform quantum operations. This feat was accomplished by using ultra-cold polar molecules as qubits, or the fundamental units of information that power the technology. The findings, recently published in the journal Nature, open new realms of possibility for harnessing the complexity of molecular structures for future applications.

“As a field we have been trying to do this for 20 years,” said senior co-author Kang-Kuen Ni, Theodore William Richards Professor of Chemistry and professor of physics. “And we’ve finally been able to do it.”