Quantum Physics

The future quantum computers should be capable of super-fast and reliable computation. Today, this is still a major challenge. Now, computer scientists led by ETH Zurich conduct an early exploration for reliable quantum machine learning.

ETH Zurich and the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI are opening a joint research centre, the ETH Zurich - PSI Quantum Computing Hub. The goal is the investigation and realisation of quantum computers. In an interview, Gabriel Aeppli, head of PSI's Photon Science Division, and Christian Rüegg, director of PSI, talk about this special collaboration and highlight what quantum computers are expected to bring us.

ETH Zurich and the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) establish a joint centre for the development of quantum computers. Its aim is to advance the realization of quantum computers based on both ion traps and superconducting components. ETH Zurich provides 32 million francs for this centre, which will host around 30 researchers.

Water can freeze from liquid to solid ice or boil into a gas. In the kitchen these “phase transitions” aren’t smooth, but their discontinuous nature is smoothed out at high pressure. An international team of physicists – led by EPFL and in collaboration with the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI – have now discovered the same behavior in certain quantum magnets, which may have consequences for the technology of qubits.

Using the IBM Q computer, physicists at EPFL have verified for the first time the tight relationship between quantum entanglement and wave-particle duality, showing that the former controls the latter in a quantum system.

Scientists from EPFL, MIT, and CEA Saclay demonstrate a state of vibration that exists simultaneously at two different times. They evidence this quantum superposition by measuring the strongest class of quantum correlations between light beams that interact with the vibration.