Wiring the Quantum Computer of the Future
(AnalyticsInsight) Quantum computing is increasingly becoming the focus of scientists in fields such as physics and chemistry,and industrialists in the pharmaceutical, airplane, and automobile industries. Globally, research labs at companies like Google and IBM are spending extensive resources on improving quantum computers, and with good reason.
But, building quantum computers for large-scale computation is proving to be a challenge in terms of their architecture. The basic units of a quantum computer are the “quantum bits” or “qubits.”
A group of scientists from Tokyo University of Science, Japan, RIKEN Centre for Emergent Matter Science, Japan, and University of Technology, Sydney, led by Prof Jaw-Shen Tsai, proposes a unique solution to this qubit accessibility problem by modifying the architecture of the qubit array. “Here, we solve this problem and present a modified superconducting micro-architecture that does not require any 3D external line technology and reverts to a completely planar design,” they say.
The scientists began with a qubit square lattice array and stretched out each column in the 2D plane. They then folded each successive column on top of each other, forming a dual one-dimensional array called a “bi-linear” array. This put all qubits on the edge and simplified the arrangement of the required wiring system.The system is also completely in 2D. In this new architecture, some of the inter-qubit wiring—each qubit is also connected to all adjacent qubits in an array—does overlap, but because these are the only overlaps in the wiring, simple local 3D systems such as airbridges at the point of overlap are enough and the system overall remains in 2D. This simplifies its construction considerably.
