Researchers create first electronic quantum processor
A team of researchers, including physicists Steven Girvin and Robert Schoelkopf, has successfully created the first rudimentary solid-state quantum processor -- bringing the dream of quantum computing one step closer. Their work, which first appeared in the June 28 advanced online publication of Nature, demonstrates, for the first time, quantum information processing with a solid-state device.
Unlike traditional quantum computing work, too small to be seen by the naked eye, the building blocks of the Yale processor are two qubits or "quantum bits" -- artificial atoms, which in this case are each made up of a billion aluminum atoms. Each qubit acts like a single atom that can occupy two different energy states (akin to the "1" and "0" or "on" and "off" states of regular bits employed by conventional computers), but can also effectively be placed in a "superposition" of multiple states at the same time, allowing for greater information storage and processing power.
According to Schoelkopf, the few simple tasks their processor is able to perform have been demonstrated before with single nuclei, atoms, and photons. "But this is the first time they've been possible in an all-electronic device that looks and feels much more like a regular microprocessor" -- a key to making the technology accessible.
A new way to study water
Yale researchers may be on the path to solving what has long eluded scientists regarding the most ubiquitous substance on earth: water. Assistant professor of mechanical engineering Eric Dufresne ’96 believes synthetic water may lead the way to unraveling the complexity of the real stuff. As published in the July 7 issue of Langmuir, Dufresne's research team has successfully synthesized colloidal particles with the geometric shape of water molecules. Their hope is that these tiny plastic water models, which they can "see" and manipulate, will allow them to better understand water's unusual collective behavior. "The idea of using synthesized colloidal particles as a model system is not new," says Dufresne. "But we've pushed the geometry to a place we haven't been before and now we're trying to push the interactions to a new place." Adding charge to the particles is an important next step, as it is water's polarity that governs interaction -- how water freezes, melts, and dissolves salts.
New professor will expand disciplines of biomedical engineering
Anjelica Gonzalez has joined the faculty as an assistant professor in biomedical engineering. Gonzalez holds a PhD in structural and computational biology from Baylor College of Medicine and conducted postdoctoral work at Texas Children's Hospital in leukocyte biology and pediatric intensive care. Her research at Yale will focus on developing biomaterials for investigating human immunological disease.
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