What is a Quantum Computer and how do you know what qualifies as a quantum computer?
Here is a short answer with not a lot of details. A quantum computer is a computer that calculates things really fast. Here is a bigger answer - a quantum computer is a computer using superpositions ( Superpositions are like Schrodinger's cat when it is in a box and if you open the box it releases poison and kills the cat so is the cat dead or alive to answer this he came up with a theory that the cat is half alive and half dead this ability to be in two states of matter is called superpositions.) of quantum states. Quantum computers are different from quantum dot computers and any computer with a transistor. Although those use quantum mechanical effects, they don’t use superpositions which is why they don’t qualify as a quantum computer.
What is the structure of a quantum computer?
A classical computer’s memory is made with bits. Each bit holds a one or a zero. A computer can compute by controlling those bits. A qubit is the same thing as bit except for a quantum computer and can hold a one or a zero. Also they can have both a one and a zero at the same time. A quantum computer can be carried out with any small particle that can have two different states. Quantum computers can be built from atoms that are excited and not excited at the same time, they might be made out of photons that have a light that is in two areas at the same time, it might be made of protons and neutrons that have a spin of “up” and “down” at the same time, or a microscopic molecule that holds thousands of protons and neutrons. It might also be used as a quantum computer that can hold many qubits.
Who came up with the quantum computer and when was it made?
In 1959 physicist Nobel prize winner Richard Feynman noted that, as electronic components begin to reach microscopic scales, effects predicted by quantum mechanics occur—which, he suggested, might be used in the design of more powerful computers. During the 1980’s and the 1990 the theory moved on far beyond Feynman speculations. In 1985 David Deutsch from the University of Oxford in England came up with how to build the quantum logic gates for a quantum computer. In 1995 Peter Shor from AT&T came up with an algorithm for how to calculate a number using only 6 qubits. Finally in 1988 Isaac Chuang at Los Alamos, Neil Gershenfeld of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Mark Kubinec of the University of California at Berkeley created the first quantum computer using only 2 qubits. It took 29 years of improving ideas and making new ideas but it became a success.
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