For all their promise, quantum computers have a hard time modeling the interactions between the two families of building blocks that underlie our Universe – can you imagine a chef that struggles to describe how sugar and milk make cake?
But researchers may have found a way to overcome this challenge by modeling a theoretical 'hybrid' quantum computer that promises to combine the best of both worlds.
The fundamental particles that make up the cosmic cake of our existence are grouped as either fermions or bosons.
In simplest terms, fermions are particles of matter, including electrons and protons, and bosons include force-mediating particles, like the photons (light) that carry the electromagnetic force.
Quantum computers are great at modeling fermions, because they're more discrete, just like the qubits that power quantum computing.
But bosons are tougher because they can occupy the same quantum state and 'overlap', meaning that one can have a quantum stack of infinite bosons.
A new theoretical framework could bypass this issue and supercharge quantum computing, thanks to a new study from a team of physicists, engineers, and computer scientists, led by Eleanor Crane, a quantum computing lecturer at King's College London.
As they describe in the journal Physical Review X, the researchers developed a hybrid quantum computing strategy that incorporates two existing technologies: the qubits that power quantum computers, and microwave cavity resonators, little boxes that contain oscillating electromagnetic fields.
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