Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing

Computer scientists have been trying to make an effective quantum computer for more than 20 years. Firms such as Google, IBM and Microsoft have developed simple machines.

But, according to Prof. Winfried Hensinger, who led the research at Sussex University, the new development paves the way for systems that can solve complex real world problems that the best computers we have today are incapable of.

"Right now we have quantum computers with very simple microchips," he said. "What we have achieved here is the ability to realise extremely powerful quantum computers capable of solving some of the most important problems for industries and society."

Currently, computers solve problems in a simple linear way, one calculation at a time. In the quantum realm, particles can be in two places at the same time and researchers want to harness this property to develop computers that can do multiple calculations all at the same time.

Quantum particles can also be millions of miles apart and be strangely connected, mirroring each other's actions instantaneously. Again, that could also be used to develop much more powerful computers.

One stumbling block has been the need to transfer quantum information between chips quickly and reliably: the information degrades, and errors are introduced.

But Prof. Hensinger's team has made a breakthrough, published in the journal Nature Communications, which may have overcome that obstacle.

The team developed a system able to transport information from one chip to another with a reliability of 99.999993% at record speeds. That, say the researchers, shows that in principle chips could be slotted together to make a more powerful quantum computer.

GHOSH, Pallab. Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing.

BBC News (online). 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado).

Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing

Computer scientists have been trying to make an effective quantum computer for more than 20 years. Firms such as Google, IBM and Microsoft have developed simple machines.

But, according to Prof. Winfried Hensinger, who led the research at Sussex University, the new development paves the way for systems that can solve complex real world problems that the best computers we have today are incapable of.

"Right now we have quantum computers with very simple microchips," he said. "What we have achieved here is the ability to realise extremely powerful quantum computers capable of solving some of the most important problems for industries and society."

Currently, computers solve problems in a simple linear way, one calculation at a time. In the quantum realm, particles can be in two places at the same time and researchers want to harness this property to develop computers that can do multiple calculations all at the same time.

Quantum particles can also be millions of miles apart and be strangely connected, mirroring each other's actions instantaneously. Again, that could also be used to develop much more powerful computers.

One stumbling block has been the need to transfer quantum information between chips quickly and reliably: the information degrades, and errors are introduced.

But Prof. Hensinger's team has made a breakthrough, published in the journal Nature Communications, which may have overcome that obstacle.

The team developed a system able to transport information from one chip to another with a reliability of 99.999993% at record speeds. That, say the researchers, shows that in principle chips could be slotted together to make a more powerful quantum computer.

GHOSH, Pallab. Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing.

BBC News (online). 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado).

Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing

Computer scientists have been trying to make an effective quantum computer for more than 20 years. Firms such as Google, IBM and Microsoft have developed simple machines.

But, according to Prof. Winfried Hensinger, who led the research at Sussex University, the new development paves the way for systems that can solve complex real world problems that the best computers we have today are incapable of.

"Right now we have quantum computers with very simple microchips," he said. "What we have achieved here is the ability to realise extremely powerful quantum computers capable of solving some of the most important problems for industries and society."

Currently, computers solve problems in a simple linear way, one calculation at a time. In the quantum realm, particles can be in two places at the same time and researchers want to harness this property to develop computers that can do multiple calculations all at the same time.

Quantum particles can also be millions of miles apart and be strangely connected, mirroring each other's actions instantaneously. Again, that could also be used to develop much more powerful computers.

One stumbling block has been the need to transfer quantum information between chips quickly and reliably: the information degrades, and errors are introduced.

But Prof. Hensinger's team has made a breakthrough, published in the journal Nature Communications, which may have overcome that obstacle.

The team developed a system able to transport information from one chip to another with a reliability of 99.999993% at record speeds. That, say the researchers, shows that in principle chips could be slotted together to make a more powerful quantum computer.

GHOSH, Pallab. Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing.

BBC News (online). 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado).

Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing

Computer scientists have been trying to make an effective quantum computer for more than 20 years. Firms such as Google, IBM and Microsoft have developed simple machines.

But, according to Prof. Winfried Hensinger, who led the research at Sussex University, the new development paves the way for systems that can solve complex real world problems that the best computers we have today are incapable of.

"Right now we have quantum computers with very simple microchips," he said. "What we have achieved here is the ability to realise extremely powerful quantum computers capable of solving some of the most important problems for industries and society."

Currently, computers solve problems in a simple linear way, one calculation at a time. In the quantum realm, particles can be in two places at the same time and researchers want to harness this property to develop computers that can do multiple calculations all at the same time.

Quantum particles can also be millions of miles apart and be strangely connected, mirroring each other's actions instantaneously. Again, that could also be used to develop much more powerful computers.

One stumbling block has been the need to transfer quantum information between chips quickly and reliably: the information degrades, and errors are introduced.

But Prof. Hensinger's team has made a breakthrough, published in the journal Nature Communications, which may have overcome that obstacle.

The team developed a system able to transport information from one chip to another with a reliability of 99.999993% at record speeds. That, say the researchers, shows that in principle chips could be slotted together to make a more powerful quantum computer.

GHOSH, Pallab. Quantum breakthrough could revolutionise computing.

BBC News (online). 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado).

Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable common resource

Game theory deals with situations in which a number of agents compete with each other, with each participant trying to maximize his or her own profit individually. One speaks of a "Nash equilibrium" if players cannot increase their returns further. The "Tragedy of the Commons" is a game theoretical scenario in which the actors do not compete directly, but indirectly: If someone takes a piece of a common pie, there will be less for everybody else.

Instead of investigating how to avoid the "Tragedy of the Commons," Claudius Gros from Goethe University's Institute for Theoretical Physics examined the resulting Nash equilibrium, with unexpected results: If a common good is divided more or less equally among N interested parties, then each receives a share of the order 1/N. However, the respective investment costs still need to be deducted.

Gros' calculations show that, in equilibrium, the actors increase their engagement until the resulting investment costs almost reach the value of the resources the individual investor can secure for her- or himself. Mathematically, the theoretical physicist was able to show that the final profit of the individual investor scales as 1/N².

The original expectation, that investors each receive a proportional share from the resource, remains correct, as Gros' research shows. However, this does not translate into an overall return of the same proportion, which is smaller by a power in the number of investors. Gros denotes the dramatic deterioration of the net profit as "catastrophic poverty," as it implies that unregulated competition drives the individual actor close to the profitability limit, viz to the subsistence level.

Similarly, Gros was able to show that catastrophic poverty can be avoided when the actors cooperate with each other.

Cooperation leads to a net profit corresponding to the number of investors in simple power, the classical result.

The result of the investigations is therefore that the "Tragedy of the Commons" can cause substantially more damage than previously assumed. Uncontrolled access not only leads to a potentially excessive exploitation of the resource, a topic that has been the focus of many previous studies. In addition, investors suffer themselves when only maximizing their own profits.

GROS, Claudius. Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable

common resource. Royal Society Open Science (online), 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado)

Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable common resource

Game theory deals with situations in which a number of agents compete with each other, with each participant trying to maximize his or her own profit individually. One speaks of a "Nash equilibrium" if players cannot increase their returns further. The "Tragedy of the Commons" is a game theoretical scenario in which the actors do not compete directly, but indirectly: If someone takes a piece of a common pie, there will be less for everybody else.

Instead of investigating how to avoid the "Tragedy of the Commons," Claudius Gros from Goethe University's Institute for Theoretical Physics examined the resulting Nash equilibrium, with unexpected results: If a common good is divided more or less equally among N interested parties, then each receives a share of the order 1/N. However, the respective investment costs still need to be deducted.

Gros' calculations show that, in equilibrium, the actors increase their engagement until the resulting investment costs almost reach the value of the resources the individual investor can secure for her- or himself. Mathematically, the theoretical physicist was able to show that the final profit of the individual investor scales as 1/N².

The original expectation, that investors each receive a proportional share from the resource, remains correct, as Gros' research shows. However, this does not translate into an overall return of the same proportion, which is smaller by a power in the number of investors. Gros denotes the dramatic deterioration of the net profit as "catastrophic poverty," as it implies that unregulated competition drives the individual actor close to the profitability limit, viz to the subsistence level.

Similarly, Gros was able to show that catastrophic poverty can be avoided when the actors cooperate with each other.

Cooperation leads to a net profit corresponding to the number of investors in simple power, the classical result.

The result of the investigations is therefore that the "Tragedy of the Commons" can cause substantially more damage than previously assumed. Uncontrolled access not only leads to a potentially excessive exploitation of the resource, a topic that has been the focus of many previous studies. In addition, investors suffer themselves when only maximizing their own profits.

GROS, Claudius. Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable

common resource. Royal Society Open Science (online), 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado)

Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable common resource

Game theory deals with situations in which a number of agents compete with each other, with each participant trying to maximize his or her own profit individually. One speaks of a "Nash equilibrium" if players cannot increase their returns further. The "Tragedy of the Commons" is a game theoretical scenario in which the actors do not compete directly, but indirectly: If someone takes a piece of a common pie, there will be less for everybody else.

Instead of investigating how to avoid the "Tragedy of the Commons," Claudius Gros from Goethe University's Institute for Theoretical Physics examined the resulting Nash equilibrium, with unexpected results: If a common good is divided more or less equally among N interested parties, then each receives a share of the order 1/N. However, the respective investment costs still need to be deducted.

Gros' calculations show that, in equilibrium, the actors increase their engagement until the resulting investment costs almost reach the value of the resources the individual investor can secure for her- or himself. Mathematically, the theoretical physicist was able to show that the final profit of the individual investor scales as 1/N².

The original expectation, that investors each receive a proportional share from the resource, remains correct, as Gros' research shows. However, this does not translate into an overall return of the same proportion, which is smaller by a power in the number of investors. Gros denotes the dramatic deterioration of the net profit as "catastrophic poverty," as it implies that unregulated competition drives the individual actor close to the profitability limit, viz to the subsistence level.

Similarly, Gros was able to show that catastrophic poverty can be avoided when the actors cooperate with each other.

Cooperation leads to a net profit corresponding to the number of investors in simple power, the classical result.

The result of the investigations is therefore that the "Tragedy of the Commons" can cause substantially more damage than previously assumed. Uncontrolled access not only leads to a potentially excessive exploitation of the resource, a topic that has been the focus of many previous studies. In addition, investors suffer themselves when only maximizing their own profits.

GROS, Claudius. Generic catastrophic poverty when selfish investors exploit a degradable

common resource. Royal Society Open Science (online), 08 Fev. 2023 (adaptado)

'A Spiraling Loop of Feedbacks':

Worst-Case Scenario for Amazon Rainforest

A paper to be published in the Journal Science on January 27 has found that humans have degraded more than one-third of the remaining trees in the Amazon rainforest. This degradation could eventually lead to "a spiraling loop of feedbacks," Jos Barlow, a professor of conservation science at Lancaster University in the U.K. and co-author of the paper, told Newsweek.

Up to 38 percent of the remaining Amazon has been affected by human actions, researchers from Brazil's University of Campinas (Unicamp), the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), National Institute for Space Research (INPE), and Lancaster University found.

The degradation of this area - equivalent to 5.5 times the size of the state of California - releases carbon emissions equivalent to or greater than those from deforestation.

The Amazon contributes 16 percent of all the land-based photosynthesis in the world, and strongly regulates global carbon and water cycles, sucking in carbon dioxide and producing oxygen. Additionally, despite only covering around 0.5 percent of the Earth's surface, the Amazon is home to over 10 percent of all named plant and vertebrate species on Earth.

"Healthy rainforests provide amazing habitat for biodiversity - this is what the Amazon is most famous for," Sally Thompson, an ecohydrologist at The University of Western Australia, told Newsweek. "They usually support clean water in rivers, make it rain, and cool the surrounding area. You can hunt, harvest timber or foods sustainably from healthy and wellmanaged forests. And a healthy forest can often recover from disturbance. Degraded forests aren't as good at doing any of those things, and often they struggle to recover from disturbance."

Deforestation involves a loss of the forest canopy and a change in land use (e.g., from forest to agriculture or urban land use), while degradation is a process affecting the remaining forests. Degradation essentially means that there is still forest in place but it is not as healthy or as good at providing benefits for the environment or for people.

THOMSON, Jess. 'A Spiraling Loop of Feedbacks': Worst-Case Scenario

for Amazon Rainforest. Newsweek (online), 26 jan. 2023 (adaptado).

'A Spiraling Loop of Feedbacks':

Worst-Case Scenario for Amazon Rainforest

A paper to be published in the Journal Science on January 27 has found that humans have degraded more than one-third of the remaining trees in the Amazon rainforest. This degradation could eventually lead to "a spiraling loop of feedbacks," Jos Barlow, a professor of conservation science at Lancaster University in the U.K. and co-author of the paper, told Newsweek.

Up to 38 percent of the remaining Amazon has been affected by human actions, researchers from Brazil's University of Campinas (Unicamp), the Amazon Environmental Research Institute (IPAM), National Institute for Space Research (INPE), and Lancaster University found.

The degradation of this area - equivalent to 5.5 times the size of the state of California - releases carbon emissions equivalent to or greater than those from deforestation.

The Amazon contributes 16 percent of all the land-based photosynthesis in the world, and strongly regulates global carbon and water cycles, sucking in carbon dioxide and producing oxygen. Additionally, despite only covering around 0.5 percent of the Earth's surface, the Amazon is home to over 10 percent of all named plant and vertebrate species on Earth.

"Healthy rainforests provide amazing habitat for biodiversity - this is what the Amazon is most famous for," Sally Thompson, an ecohydrologist at The University of Western Australia, told Newsweek. "They usually support clean water in rivers, make it rain, and cool the surrounding area. You can hunt, harvest timber or foods sustainably from healthy and wellmanaged forests. And a healthy forest can often recover from disturbance. Degraded forests aren't as good at doing any of those things, and often they struggle to recover from disturbance."

Deforestation involves a loss of the forest canopy and a change in land use (e.g., from forest to agriculture or urban land use), while degradation is a process affecting the remaining forests. Degradation essentially means that there is still forest in place but it is not as healthy or as good at providing benefits for the environment or for people.

THOMSON, Jess. 'A Spiraling Loop of Feedbacks': Worst-Case Scenario

for Amazon Rainforest. Newsweek (online), 26 jan. 2023 (adaptado).