Quantum
Quantum:
A word filled with mystery about a recently (100 years) discovered magical domain. The world we see is the statistical outcome of quantum events. If you toss a coin a billion times you will statistically have 500 million heads and 500 million tales, or very close to. This is our “real” or macro world. In the quantum world of individual particles, the world is more like being in the middle of a single coin toss with the outcome yet to be decided.
There are a number of quantum effects that appear to be at odds with reality and we are only beginning the journey of understanding them. My advice is to not try too hard to understand quantum things in macro ways, just go with the flow and appreciate the diversity. Some of the basic fun includes – virtual particles that simply pop in and out of existence; entanglement of particles where each particle shares a quantum state whatever the distance apart; uncertainty or the problem of not being able to know everything about a particle and the Schrodinger’s cat problem where measurement affects the outcome plus the wave or particle issue.
We know all of these things are real at quantum levels as they can be demonstrated in the macro world and can be used for all sorts of interesting engineering. Entanglement, or what Einstein called ‘Spooky action at a distance”, and was somewhat of an unbeliever is perhaps the area with the most research in current times. The big question is, can we build a useful quantum computer?
If we can, and it is still a big if, then we will have another level of computing power that can probably break modern day encryption techniques, creating all sorts of problems, particularly for banks. Conventional computers, based on 0 and 1s will still lead for some processes and quantum computers based on entangled, unmeasured particles (electrons or photons or whatever) in an undefined state. Quantum computers will allow a multitude more parallel computation.
So, are we close to having quantum computers? The short answer is yes, we already have some very basic ones, even some that can solve a problem that conventional computers can’t. But it is a bit like nuclear fusion where a working, useful system is still probably 20 years away, if ever.
Today’s quantum computers are hugely expensive, run at near zero degrees temperature, have perhaps 50 entangled particles and are very error prone. To scale up to something useful they would need millions of entangled particles with quality error checking capability. The major US tech companies and a number of governments are throwing serious money at the problems and are improving day by day and are both somewhat secretive and somewhat boastful about their achievements.
Australia sits in a pretty good place, research wise, with a number of promising projects including a quantum microscope that will assist medical science studies greatly. It is good to see the government supporting this research after many years of neglect. There are many promising projects including Australia’s cyber security.
Is there an imminent security issue? Probably not, but it is a good idea to keep up with the times.
A word filled with mystery about a recently (100 years) discovered magical domain. The world we see is the statistical outcome of quantum events. If you toss a coin a billion times you will statistically have 500 million heads and 500 million tales, or very close to. This is our “real” or macro world. In the quantum world of individual particles, the world is more like being in the middle of a single coin toss with the outcome yet to be decided.
There are a number of quantum effects that appear to be at odds with reality and we are only beginning the journey of understanding them. My advice is to not try too hard to understand quantum things in macro ways, just go with the flow and appreciate the diversity. Some of the basic fun includes – virtual particles that simply pop in and out of existence; entanglement of particles where each particle shares a quantum state whatever the distance apart; uncertainty or the problem of not being able to know everything about a particle and the Schrodinger’s cat problem where measurement affects the outcome plus the wave or particle issue.
We know all of these things are real at quantum levels as they can be demonstrated in the macro world and can be used for all sorts of interesting engineering. Entanglement, or what Einstein called ‘Spooky action at a distance”, and was somewhat of an unbeliever is perhaps the area with the most research in current times. The big question is, can we build a useful quantum computer?
If we can, and it is still a big if, then we will have another level of computing power that can probably break modern day encryption techniques, creating all sorts of problems, particularly for banks. Conventional computers, based on 0 and 1s will still lead for some processes and quantum computers based on entangled, unmeasured particles (electrons or photons or whatever) in an undefined state. Quantum computers will allow a multitude more parallel computation.
So, are we close to having quantum computers? The short answer is yes, we already have some very basic ones, even some that can solve a problem that conventional computers can’t. But it is a bit like nuclear fusion where a working, useful system is still probably 20 years away, if ever.
Today’s quantum computers are hugely expensive, run at near zero degrees temperature, have perhaps 50 entangled particles and are very error prone. To scale up to something useful they would need millions of entangled particles with quality error checking capability. The major US tech companies and a number of governments are throwing serious money at the problems and are improving day by day and are both somewhat secretive and somewhat boastful about their achievements.
Australia sits in a pretty good place, research wise, with a number of promising projects including a quantum microscope that will assist medical science studies greatly. It is good to see the government supporting this research after many years of neglect. There are many promising projects including Australia’s cyber security.
Is there an imminent security issue? Probably not, but it is a good idea to keep up with the times.
No comments have been added yet.
