University of Bristol team takes major step towards quantum computing

An international research group of scientists and engineers led by the University of Bristol, UK, has made an important advance towards a quantum computer by shrinking down key components and integrating them onto a silicon microchip. Scientists and engineers from an international collaboration led by Dr Mark Thompson from the University of Bristol have, for the first time, generated and manipulated single particles of light on a silicon chip.

Researchers are a little bit closer to a practical quantum computer after a University of Bristol team discovered how to produce and control photons–a key component of quantum computing–on the same chip as other essential parts. They published their work in Nature Photonics today. Before now, researchers had developed parts that produce and detect photons, AKA the particles that make up light, but they were always located on their own chips. In order to make a computer cost and energy efficient, it’s important that all the components be packed onto one chip.