A potentially game-changing theoretical approach to quantum computing hardware avoids much of the problematic complexity found in current quantum computers. The strategy implements an algorithm in natural quantum interactions to process a variety of real-world problems faster than classical computers or conventional gate-based quantum computers can.
Longer-lived qubitsquantum entanglement
Quantum computing remains a nascent field handicapped by the difficulty of connecting qubits in long strings of logic gates and maintaining the quantum entanglement required for computation. Entanglement breaks down in a process known as decoherence, as the entangled qubits begin to interact with the world outside the quantum system of the computer, introducing errors. That happens quickly, limiting the computation time. True error correction has not yet been implemented on quantum hardware.
The Los Alamos team's theoretical paper showed how the approach could solve a number-partitioning problem using Grover's algorithm faster than existing quantum computers. As one of the best-known quantum algorithms, it allows unstructured searches of large data sets that gobble up conventional computing resources.