Posted on 01/31/2011 1:04:32 PM PST by decimon
(Santa Barbara, Calif.) –– Inspired by the popular confidence trick known as "shell game," researchers at UC Santa Barbara have demonstrated the ability to hide and shuffle "quantum-mechanical peas" –– microwave single photons –– under and between three microwave resonators, or "quantized shells."
In a paper published in the Jan. 30 issue of the journal Nature Physics, UCSB researchers show the first demonstration of the coherent control of a multi-resonator architecture. This topic has been a holy grail among physicists studying photons at the quantum-mechanical level for more than a decade.
The UCSB researchers are Matteo Mariantoni, postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Physics; Haohua Wang, postdoctoral fellow in physics; John Martinis, professor of physics; and Andrew Cleland, professor of physics.
According to the paper, the "shell man," the researcher, makes use of two superconducting quantum bits (qubits) to move the photons –– particles of light –– between the resonators. The qubits –– the quantum-mechanical equivalent of the classical bits used in a common PC –– are studied at UCSB for the development of a quantum super computer. They constitute one of the key elements for playing the photon shell game.
"This is an important milestone toward the realization of a large-scale quantum register," said Mariantoni. "It opens up an entirely new dimension in the realm of on-chip microwave photonics and quantum-optics in general."
The researchers fabricated a chip where three resonators of a few millimeters in length are coupled to two qubits. "The architecture studied in this work resembles a quantum railroad," said Mariantoni. "Two quantum stations –– two of the three resonators –– are interconnected through the third resonator which acts as a quantum bus. The qubits control the traffic and allow the shuffling of photons among the resonators."
In a related experiment, the researchers played a more complex game that was inspired by an ancient mathematical puzzle developed in an Indian temple called the Towers of Hanoi, according to legend.
The Towers of Hanoi puzzle consists of three posts and a pile of disks of different diameter, which can slide onto any post. The puzzle starts with the disks in a stack in ascending order of size on one post, with the smallest disk at the top. The aim of the puzzle is to move the entire stack to another post, with only one disk being moved at a time, and with no disk being placed on top of a smaller disk.
In the quantum-mechanical version of the Towers of Hanoi, the three posts are represented by the resonators and the disks by quanta of light with different energy. "This game demonstrates that a truly Bosonic excitation can be shuffled among resonators –– an interesting example of the quantum-mechanical nature of light," said Mariantoni.
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Mariantoni was supported in this work by an Elings Prize Fellowship in Experimental Science from UCSB's California NanoSystems Institute.
Credit: Erik Lucero, Matteo Mariantoni, Dario Mariantoni
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Holy hidden photon ping.
I am truly starting to worry about myself as the first thing I thought of after reading that sentence was Chris Matthews.
Note to self: cut down on the caffeine.
Big Deal.
And worry you should. ;-)
No, no, the Big Deal is three card monte.
BM scientists discovered how to move and position individual atoms on a metal surface using a scanning tunneling microscope. The technique was demonstrated in April 1990 at IBM's Almaden Research Center in San Jose, Calif., where scientists created the world's first structure: the letters "I-B-M" -- assembled one atom at a time.
*yawn* Get back to me when they have quantum dogs playing poker.
Go Gauchos! And yeah, they’s sum pretty smart fellas ova deah.
I had that poster on my wall in high school.
Love!
Light en up, Francis.
So *that’s* why I haven’t been able to find my microwave single photons.
Look under the taco shell.
Maybe you'll be able to pick a box that actually has a cat in it.
Really cut down on that commute ...um....time...
These are quantum cats. Just looking at them puts them into different boxes.
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