In February 2012 IBM scientists said that they have made several breakthroughs in quantum computing that put them "on the cusp of building systems that will take computing to a whole new level."[46]

In April 2012 a multinational team of researchers from the University of Southern California, Delft University of Technology, the Iowa State University of Science and Technology, and the University of California, Santa Barbara, constructed a two-qubit quantum computer on a crystal of diamond doped with some manner of impurity, that can easily be scaled up in size and functionality at room temperature. Two logical qubit directions of electron spin and nitrogen kernels spin were used. A system which formed an impulse of microwave radiation of certain duration and the form was developed for maintenance of protection against decoherence. By means of this computer Grover's algorithm for four variants of search has generated the right answer from the first try in 95% of cases.

Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works. Anything that’s invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty- five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it. Anything invented after you’re thirty-five is against the natural order of things.
   
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Quote:


Don't hold your breath.
I don't believe there will ever be a quantum computer that does any useful processing.

Who found ten million dollars to drop on the first commercially available quantum computer? Lockheed Martin, it seems, as the aerospace defense contractor has just begun a "multi-year contract" with the quantum annealing experts at D-Wave to develop... nothing that they're ready or willing to publicly discuss at this time. This "strategic relationship" marks the second major vote of confidence in D-Wave's technology, after Google built image detection algorithms for the company's processors a couple years back. Or, perhaps Lockheed Martin just wants a new shiny black toy for the Skunk Works labs. PR after the break.

muso wrote on Apr 27^th, 2012 at 11:45am:



Muso,
That must be a hoax.

The D-Wave One System (Credit: D-Wave)

On Friday, Lockheed Martin installed its D-Wave Quantum Computer at USC’s Information Sciences Institute in Marina Del Rey, California. Lockheed Martin purchased the system in May, and their contract with D-Wave includes operations and maintenance by D-Wave.


D-Wave’s claims to quantum computing have been met with some skepticism in the past, but a paper in Nature demonstrating a part of those claims created a lot of buzz in the quantum computing community. That said, there’s still some skepticism, some of which was explained in an interview I conducted with MIT’s Scott Aaronson earlier this year.

Depending on what type of applications the D-Wave One System is applied to, however, it may well be that some of the concerns will be alleviated soon. I’ll be interested to see what kind of work is conducted at USC on behalf of Lockheed, and I’m hopeful that most of it will be made public. Certainly USC Engineering Dean Yannis Yortsos, is excited by the possibilities, stating at the installation that:

    “This is merely the first step in a much larger world,” Yortsos said.

    Yortsos said the system will break new ground, much like the first commercially available computer in the United States, the Universal Automatic Computer (Univac).

    “The D-Wave One Adiabatic Quantum Computer represents not merely the latest ancestor of Univac, but the next big leap — the advent of scalable quantum computing,” Yortsos said. “Truly, D-Wave Systems has created something revolutionary: a 128 qubit quantum chip that augurs the possibility of solving some of the world’s most complex optimization and machine learning problems.”

USC recently opened the USC-Lockheed Martin Quantum Computing Center, which houses the world’s first commercial operational quantum processor. USC Dornsife researchers will play a key role in advancing the center’s groundbreaking research.