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Cited by 124Quantum Computing Algorithms and ArchitectureQuantum Mechanics and ApplicationsQuantum Information and Cryptography

Is quantum mechanics useful?

Landauer, Rolf·1995·Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A: Physical and Engineering Sciences
DOI 10.1098/rsta.1995.0106
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Abstract

Technologies differ in their explicit utilization of quantum mechanical behaviour. A transistor, despite its roots in energy band structure, does not invoke quantum mechanically coherent transmission between terminals. The impressive progress in the past decade in mesoscopic physics, when combined with studies that have analysed a totally quantum mechanical computational process, suggest that we may be ready to move toward more quantum mechanical procedures for information processing. This paper is a warning signal; this possibility is beset by problems. The case will be made via two separate but complementary arguments. First, by summarizing this author's published comments on computation via totally quantum mechanical coherent Hamiltonians. The computation is likely to suffer from localization, i.e. from reflection of the computational trajectory, causing the computation to turn around. Additionally, small errors will accumulate and cause the computation to go off track. This is supplemented by analysis of specific proposals that suggest more detailed machinery than invoked in the general literature on quantum mechanical Hamiltonian computation.

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  • Allowing qubits to be input at different times to the circuit is crucial because it provides a way to discard entropy accumulating in the circuit.

    “It is also crucial that we allow qubits to be input at different times to the circuit unlike (Yao[75]), because this provides a way to discard entropy which is accumulating in the circuit.”

    From Fault-Tolerant Quantum Computation with Constant Error Rate (2008) · cites this paper as [75]

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Authors
Landauer, R.
Affiliations
IBM (United States) (US)
Corresponding author
Landauer, Rolf
Venue
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A: Physical and Engineering Sciences
Publisher
The Royal Society
Published
1995-12-15
Volume
353
Issue
1703
Pages
367-376
ISSN
  • 0962-8428 (ISSN-L)
  • 2054-0299
DOI
10.1098/rsta.1995.0106
OpenAlex
W4249266103
Cited by
124
References
3
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 2 · 2023: 1 · 2022: 1 · 2020: 4 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 1 · 2014: 2 · 2013: 2 · 2012: 2
FWCI
22.42
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
royalsociety.org/journals/ethics-policies/data-sharing-mining/ (tdm)
Locations
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London Series A Physical and Engineering Sciences (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Quantum Computing Algorithms and Architecture
  • Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics › Quantum Mechanics and Applications
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Artificial Intelligence › Quantum Information and Cryptography
Keywords
quantum computing, localization, error accumulation, mesoscopic physics, quantum information processing, quantum coherence

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