[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
Infinite Improbability Drive?
Am I reading this correctly, or will the 'infinite improbability
drive' be invented real soon now? (An odd coincidence after the Tesla
thread too...)
--Rob
> Edupage, 26 January 1997. Edupage, a summary of news about information
> technology, is provided three times a week as a service by Educom,
> a Washington, D.C.-based consortium of leading colleges and universities
> seeking to transform education through the use of information technology.
[..]
> COMPUTER IN A COFFEE CUP
> While a conventional computer stores its bits of information by assuming one
> of two possible states (a 1 or a 0), a quantum computer theoretically could
> store much more information by using all the potential states of anatom.
> Scientists are now proposing a new way to harness the power of quantum
> computing, using nuclear magnetic resonance devices to control the movement
> of millions of atoms within an evenly heated volume of material. By
> coordinating the nuclear spin of the particles, physicists could make them
> act collectively as qubits (quantum bits). A liquid with the rightthermal
> properties (such as coffee, which is known for its unusually evenheating
> characteristics) could hold up to 10 qubits, but scientists are still
> looking for ways to create a liquid computer that could hold up to 40 qubits
> -- perhaps out of "a really expensive cup of structured coffee," says a
> University of California, Santa Barbara researcher. (Science News 18 Jan 97
> p37)