Controversial Computer Is at Least a Little Quantum Mechanical

If the experiment was meant to silence the critics, it didn’t. Four years ago, an upstart tech company created a stir when it claimed to have built a quantum computer—a thing that, in principle, could solve problems ordinary computers can’t. Physicists from D-Wave Systems in Burnaby, Canada, even put on a demonstration. But other researchers questioned whether there was anything quantum mechanical going on inside the device. Now, the D-Wave team has published data that they say prove quantum phenomena are at work within its chip. But even if that’s true, others still doubt that, as D-Wave researchers claim, the chip can do quantum-mechanical computations.