Well in the future light may be a possibility, and light is merely a photon, and you can have photons basically follow the same paths in each direction simultaneously without colliding.
So without in any way being an expert, I would think that if light can somehow be controlled precisely enough, that would be a possibility to go way below what any atom can. Even if the paths need to be directed by atoms.
But AFAIK there is not a practical working model for that yet, although research on it has been going on for decades.
Not an expert but… typical computers do what they do by transmitting (primarily) electrical signals between components. Is there electricity or isn’t there. It’s the “bit” with two states - on or off, 1 or 0. Electricity is the flow of electrons between atoms. Basically, we take atoms that aren’t very attached to some of their electrons and manipulate them so that they pass the electrons along when we want them to. I don’t know if there is a way to conduct and process electrical signals without using an atom’s relationship with its electrons.
Quantum computing is the suspected new way to get to “better” computing. I don’t know much about the technical side of that, beyond that they use quantum physics to expand the bit to something like a qubit, which exploits superposition (quantum particles existing in multiple states simultaneously until measured, like the Schrodinger’s cat metaphor) and entanglement (if two quantum particles’ states are related to or dependent on each other, determining the state of one particle also determines the state of the other) to transmit/process more than just a simple 1 or 0 per qubit. A lot more information can be transmitted and processed simultaneously with a more complex bit. As I understand it, quantum computing has been very slow going.
That’s my shitty explanation. I’m sure someone will come along and correct my inaccurate simplification of how it all works and list all that I missed, like fiberoptic transmission of signals.
Quantum computing can’t achieve better outcomes for general computing problems than classical computing can. It’s just possible to do particular kinds of algorithms with it (like Shor‘s Algorithm for factorising prime numbers) that classical computing can’t do. It’s still a lot of smoke and mirrors at the moment though.
That’s super cool. I’m asking as a total layman, what’s preventing the use of subatomic particles as transistors ?
Heisenberg uncertainty probably is a big barrier
Well in the future light may be a possibility, and light is merely a photon, and you can have photons basically follow the same paths in each direction simultaneously without colliding.
So without in any way being an expert, I would think that if light can somehow be controlled precisely enough, that would be a possibility to go way below what any atom can. Even if the paths need to be directed by atoms.
But AFAIK there is not a practical working model for that yet, although research on it has been going on for decades.
I see. Isn’t this more or less the premise of quantum computing ?
Not an expert but… typical computers do what they do by transmitting (primarily) electrical signals between components. Is there electricity or isn’t there. It’s the “bit” with two states - on or off, 1 or 0. Electricity is the flow of electrons between atoms. Basically, we take atoms that aren’t very attached to some of their electrons and manipulate them so that they pass the electrons along when we want them to. I don’t know if there is a way to conduct and process electrical signals without using an atom’s relationship with its electrons.
Quantum computing is the suspected new way to get to “better” computing. I don’t know much about the technical side of that, beyond that they use quantum physics to expand the bit to something like a qubit, which exploits superposition (quantum particles existing in multiple states simultaneously until measured, like the Schrodinger’s cat metaphor) and entanglement (if two quantum particles’ states are related to or dependent on each other, determining the state of one particle also determines the state of the other) to transmit/process more than just a simple 1 or 0 per qubit. A lot more information can be transmitted and processed simultaneously with a more complex bit. As I understand it, quantum computing has been very slow going.
That’s my shitty explanation. I’m sure someone will come along and correct my inaccurate simplification of how it all works and list all that I missed, like fiberoptic transmission of signals.
Quantum computing can’t achieve better outcomes for general computing problems than classical computing can. It’s just possible to do particular kinds of algorithms with it (like Shor‘s Algorithm for factorising prime numbers) that classical computing can’t do. It’s still a lot of smoke and mirrors at the moment though.
Ok, that paper is pretty fabulous. That does make for a good sanity check for quantum computing feasibility.
That said, don’t be surprised when these things catch up quickly!