Scientists have made a breakthrough in quantum computing by creating a functioning multi-qubit quantum computer within a diamond. And it operates at room temperature without shielding. The first qubit was formed with the spin state of a rogue nitrogen nucleus trapped in the impurity of a diamond. The second qubit was made from synchronizing the first qubit to the spin of an electron trapped within another impurity in the diamond. They cracked the problem of disruptive environmental interactions by protecting the quantum information stored in the subatomic particle’s spin from decoherence with microwave pulses that repeatedly reversed the electron’s spin back and forth.
They were able to prove that their diamond computer used quantum effects to solve a search problem by showing that the system behaved according to Grover’s quantum search algorithm. Normally when searching an unsorted dataset, sometimes you’d find it on the first try, other times after searching through the whole dataset, but after many searches on average you’d find what you’re looking for after searching through half the dataset. In other words, if you had a dataset of 4 items, on average you’d find it after 2 tries. With Grover’s quantum search algorithm, a quantum computer would find the correct answer the first try every time. The quantum system created by the team was able to find the correct answer on the first try 95% time. While not perfect, it is enough to demonstrate that it operates in a quantum fashion.