Dr. Steve Rolston
Professor & Co-Director
Joint Quantum Institute
Dept. of Physics, University of Maryland
Where is My Quantum Computer?
Twenty years ago mathematician Peter Shor proved that a computer based on the laws of quantum mechanics could in principle factor large numbers in polynomial time, a problem believed to be exponentially difficult for classical computation. Given the importance of this problem to modern cryptography, it understandably stimulated a great deal of excitement and effort. Dozens of candidate systems have been proposed and many worked on, but we are still many years away from a machine that threatens our financial transactions. In this talk I will highlight the challenges to build large, controllable systems that maintain their quantum character, and look at where we are, where we will be going, and what we have learned along the way.