The common unique concept you will learn about quantum computer is something goes by the name QUBIT
QUBIT is the presentation of data that differentiate quantum computer from classical one
In classical computer, data is presented by a strings of 0 and 1 for example 23 in machine language is presented as 10111, which are called bits
A bit in classical computer can either be 1 or 0 but not 0 and 1 at the same time
In Qubit, a state can be 0 and 1 at the same time using quantum mechanics properties
And here my confusion begins….
The usage of quantum promises breakthrough in solving complicated problems that may take a number of years to solve using conventional computers (including supercomputer)
That’s why you see a race among companies as well as states particularly China and USA is now taking new shape
But the reality is that quantum computer is not widely adopted and it remains the projects conducted in Research laboratories
Most of its challenges have not been solved at all and still it doesn’t offer the solution it is intended to provide
A current state
The big advantage of quantum computing is a process called entanglement
Entanglement happens when two tiniest particles linked together and the connection between them remain even when the particles are very far away in a space
The measurement of one particle informs you the measurement of another entangled particles
This offers parallelism computation as the computer can calculates lot of data simultaneously
But qubit entanglement is not easy thing at moment [1]
There are some slight progresses increased the number of qubits in single chip
One company has built quantum computer with more than 1000 qubits
Before this IBM Q led in term of computer with many qubits
But the current number of qubits can’t break RSA based security
Challenges that hard to beat
Quantum computer tries manipulate quantum mechanics to perform complicated task
Quantum mechanics describes the properties of particles when it is in a very tiniest state.
The tiniest particles are very venerable to its surrounding environment for example heat
When surrounding interferes the computation error occurs
For that reason, quantum computer can not be placed in room temperature
There must be some kind of refrigerator for protection of qubits
And also putting many quantum bits still proves a challenge due to number of factors including cooling requirement
It seems the great benefit of this cutting-edge computing is not going to happen soon
The progress to solve the challenges relating to quantum computer is very slow
For many years to come, convention computer will still be used in many fields
This means understanding particles at molecule levels for drug discovery is still delusion at moment
But what worries me more, USA corporations (specifically Google, Microsoft and IBM) are at front runner on quantum computer research activities
Once a serious breakthrough is made their greed of making super profit will prevail
See what happens in AI.
OpenAI was expected to be open-source project but now it works as a for-profit company under the backup of Microsoft funds
Breakthrough
For the first in 2025 the largest computer composes of 1120 qubits
Yet they are not enough to solve real word complicated challenges
And the company that developed this computer is Atomic Computing from California, USA
Atomic’s computer uses different kind of qubits as compared to the ones that are commonly used by Google and IBM
And Microsoft has developed quantum chip that employs materials known as topoconductor which are going to manipulate majorana particles
According to Microsoft, in the future this will help build a quantum system consisting of millions of qubits
Their chip is called Majorana 1
Hard reality
Most of us we are not going to use this kind of computer
Classical computer still solves lot of our needs
Basing on what it is expected to do, quantum computer will remain to be used by governments, research institutes, corporations and so on
The areas that quantum computer will benefit are AI in training and data synthesis, drug discovery and cryptography
All of these applications are basing on institution and industrial environments
Looking at CNBC interview with Julian Kelly, Director of Quantum Hardware at Google tells me quantum computer is overhyped at least for now
And the companies use it to boost their stock prices