Mirror Magazine

Mirror Magazine

Techno Page - By Harendra Alwis

Life in the fast lane
Time... or space? Each generation seems to walk through this earth at an ever faster speed. Change swoops over us as always and we follow like rats captivated by the music of a magical pipe. We're speeding up; our lives are speeding up with the acceleration of technology; our arts and entertainment is speeding up with broadband Internet and cable TV and the pace of discovery and change itself is speeding up. Do we seek to understand what is going on? Do we care? Time, which has no beginning or end (and which I am made to believe is not continuous but rather like matter, is made up of 'quanta' of smallest units that could be measured) passes us by but do we seek to understand how it works? We double the speed of our computers in a matter of months but we do not know what time is. If we don't understand time, will we become its victims?

Do you think faster and more powerful computers will be the answer to the problems we seek to solve? If so, how fast must they be? If not, what is it that we are searching for? Some believe that neurosciences hold the key to intelligent computers while others put their money on genetics. Yet others are looking at quantum mechanics. Have you got any ideas of your own? Write into technopage_lk@yahoo.com

Quantum Computers - Obstacles and research
Quantum information processing and quantum computing have made numerous promising advancements since their conception. However, a few potentially large obstacles still remain that prevent us from building a quantum computer that can rival today's modern digital computer. Among these difficulties, decoherence, and hardware architecture are probably the most formidable.

Decoherence is the tendency of a quantum computer to decay from a given quantum state into an incoherent state as it interacts, or entangles, with the state of the environment. These interactions between the environment and qubits are unavoidable, and induce the breakdown of information stored in the quantum computer, and thus errors in computation. Before any quantum computer is capable of solving hard problems, research must devise a way to maintain and minimize decoherence. Thanks to the theory of quantum error correction small scale quantum computers have been built and the prospects of large quantum computers are looking up. Currently, research is underway to discover methods for battling the destructive effects of decoherence.

Presently, only a few of the benefits of quantum information processing and quantum computing are readily obvious, but before more possibilities are uncovered theory must be put to the test. In order to do this, devices capable of quantum computation must be constructed. Quantum computing hardware is, however, still in its infancy, even at research level. As a result of several significant experiments, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) has become the most popular component in quantum hardware architecture. In 1999, physicists at Los Alamos National Laboratory and MIT constructed the first experimental demonstrations of a quantum computer using NMR technology. To date, designs have involved ion traps, optical cavities, quantum dots, Josephson Junctions and NMR. Though these devices have had mild successes in performing interesting experiments, the technologies each have serious limitations. The future of quantum computer hardware architecture is likely to be very different from what we know today; however, the current research has helped to provide insight as to what obstacles the future will hold for these devices.

At present, quantum computers and quantum information technology remains in its formative stage. At this very moment obstacles are being surmounted that will provide the knowledge needed to thrust quantum computers up to their rightful position as the fastest computational machines in existence. Promising progress has been made and nearing a point now where we may have the tools required to build a computer robust enough to adequately withstand the effects of decoherence. Quantum hardware, on the other hand, remains an emerging field, but the work done thus far suggests that it will only be a matter of time before we have devices large enough to test Shor's, Grover's and other quantum algorithms. Thereby, quantum computers will emerge as the superior computational devices at the very least, and perhaps one day make today's modern computer obsolete. Quantum computation has its origins in highly specialized fields of theoretical physics, but its future undoubtedly lies in the profound effect it will have on the lives of all of us.

This still young field of quantum information processing and quantum computation has already achieved a multitude of exciting and surprising insights - both in the foundations of quantum mechanics and its applications to problems of communication and computation. With many dedicated groups now working in this area, more surprises and breakthroughs are to be expected. Earlier in most universities research on quantum computing was carried out by their physics divisions but now the progress is such that, most of these universities have independent divisions to deal with quantum computing, quantum optics etc. Also a new journal, "Quantum Information and Computation", dedicated to quantum information processing has been formed to report on new developments in this field.
Sent in by
Nuwan Karunaratne

10.20 GHz Intel 'Nehalem' by 2005?
The Internet is abuzz with gossip about Intel's future plans for their upcoming desktop processors up until the year 2005.

The first of these processors is rumoured to be the Prescott-core CPU, which could debut by the end of this year at 5.20GHz with an 800 MHz system bus. Following the Prescott is the Tejas-core CPU, lined up for arrival by the end of 2004 at 5.60GHz using a 1066 MHz system bus. The speed step increments planned for the Tejas will be 6GHz, 6.40GHz, 6.80GHz, 7.20GHz, 7.60GHz, 7GHz, 8.40GHz, 8.80GHz and finally 9.20GHz.

By 2005, Intel hopes to have their 9.60GHz Nehalem-core processor ready. With luck, they should be able to introduce a 10.20GHz version of the processor featuring a 1200MHz front side bus in the same year.
I-news

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