2008/05/01 by Alexandre Zagoskin, Alexandre Blais · 2 citations
Physics and Astronomy · #cond-mat.supr-con #cond-mat.mes-hall
published as Physics in Canada, v.63, 215-227 (2007) · Invited review article
arxiv created 2008/05/01 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01
From a physicist's standpoint, the most interesting part of quantum computing research may well be the possibility to probe the boundary between the quantum and the classical worlds. The more macroscopic are the structures involved, the better. So far, the most "macroscopic" qubit prototypes that have been studied in the laboratory are certain kinds of superconducting qubits. To get a feeling for how macroscopic these systems can be, the states of flux qubits which are brought in a quantum superposition corresponds to currents composed of as much as 105-106 electrons flowing in opposite directions in a superconducting loop. Non-superconducting qubits realized so far are all essentially microscopic.