NIST Demonstrates ‘Universal’ Programmable Quantum Processor for
Quantum Computers For Immediate Release: November 16, 2009
Contact: Laura Ost BOULDER, Colo.— Physicists at the National
Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have demonstrated
the first "universal" programmable quantum information processor
able to run any program allowed by quantum mechanics—the rules
governing the submicroscopic world—using two quantum bits
(qubits) of information. The processor could be a module in a
future quantum computer, which theoretically could solve some
important problems that are intractable today. The NIST
demonstration, described in Nature Physics,* marks the first
time any research group has moved beyond demonstrating
individual tasks for a quantum processor—as done previously at
NIST and elsewhere—to perform programmable processing, combining
enough inputs and continuous steps to run any possible two-qubit
program. The NIST team also analyzed the quantum processor with
the methods used in traditional comp