Chapter 1180 Five Hundred Qubits!

After leaving the Jinling Institute for Advanced Study, Academician Liu felt as if he was sleepwalking, and his head was in chaos.

After the physical demonstration, Lu Zhou explained the application of topological quantum theory in model insulators to the experts from the Chinese Academy of Sciences from the theoretical level, and how he used some basic carbon-based integration Circuit elements as well as Josephson junctions to realize Majorana fermions.

Objectively speaking, if you want to understand him who is engaged in applied research, it is really difficult to understand those complicated physical and mathematical formulas.

But fortunately, although the formula accounts for more than 70% of the part, there are dynamic graphics as a demonstration, so that they can't completely understand the mystery.

It's just that after listening to this "extraordinary" class, he felt that the worldview he had spent decades building was almost completely refreshed.

It took less than 1 second to disassemble the product of prime numbers with more than 1024 bits, which at least shows that the calculator in his hand has at least 500 qubits.

However, this is not the most important thing. The most important thing is that this quantum computer is only the size of a palm! I don't know how many times smaller than the quantum computer in the Chinese Academy of Sciences!

And if it is compared horizontally, the best results they achieved are only 20 qubits...

This is the latest achievement of this year.

In addition, compared with the box-sized quantum computer, what shocked him more was Academician Lu himself who stood on the stage and explained these theories to them.

Mathematics, physics, materials, and integrated circuit design... If it is further divided, the knowledge points covered in this class can even be subdivided into more than a dozen subject branches.

However, for the young man who is not yet thirty years old, those profound and obscure knowledge seem to be at his fingertips in his hands, and there is no obstacle in using them.

If he hadn't seen it with his own eyes, he would never have believed that someone in this world could be so good.

Perhaps, this is the reason why he was able to overcome world-class problems one after another...

After getting into the car parked at the entrance of the research institute, Academician Liu suddenly sighed with emotion.

"I feel like...maybe I need to go back to school and re-educate."

Director Li's expression was quite calm.

After all, surprise is nothing but surprise, and that was only for the technology itself. As for those esoteric theories, he couldn't understand anyway, so he didn't take it to heart at all.

Looking at Academician Liu with a melancholy expression, he comforted him with words.

"... After all, it is Academician Lu, and his class is really difficult to understand, so don't take it too seriously. I believe it's the same even if other people come here to sit and sit, not to mention that you don't understand."

"It's not a question of whether to take it to heart or not," Academician Liu shook his head and said, "It's just that sometimes I really feel that I can't keep up with this era."

"Although the topic of topological quantum computing is relatively new, some people in our institute are also working on it. The target is the Majorana fermion project of Microsoft. However, whether it is the project of Academician Pan or the one in our institute Projects against Microsoft, or Microsoft's own... qubits have always been around the number twenty or thirty."

Upon hearing this, Director Li didn't bother to comfort him anymore, and hurriedly asked.

"Then how much did Professor Lu do?"

Academician Liu: "I forgot to ask for the exact number, but judging from the display just now... there are at least 500."

500...

That's an order of magnitude higher!

There was a long silence in the carriage.

After a long while, Director Li sighed faintly as if he had come to his senses.

"...It's really scary."

...

If we only talk about the importance of technology itself, the importance of quantum computers is undoubtedly far more than that of carbon-based chips themselves.

It is not an exaggeration to say that it can even be compared with controllable fusion technology.

According to generally accepted views, the three pillars of modern technology are energy, information, and materials, and quantum computers have basically stood at the culmination of this century's fantasy and hopeful future information technology.

And not only that.

The most important thing is that traditional encryption methods are like stripping naked in front of quantum computers, and there is no defense at all.

This is also the scariest part of this technology.

As we all know, not only IT and finance, more than 90% of the security of modern information networks rely on asymmetric public key encryption, and the most widely used one is the RSA encryption algorithm.

Since there is no fixed formula for the factorization of the product of large prime numbers, and there is only a unique solution, in principle, as long as the product of prime numbers used is large enough, it basically has no solution, even if Professor Lu calculates it. Probably figured out in my lifetime.

However, in the face of quantum computers, this kind of problem that takes hundreds of years to solve for traditional computers can be solved in only a few seconds or even less than a second.

Even if some people may say that the asymmetric public key encryption algorithm is not just RSA, but also elliptic curve encryption, Elgamal encryption, etc. These schemes based on discrete logarithms...

But what is it compared to the computing power of a quantum computer?

I'm afraid it's not even troublesome.

After returning home at night, Lu Zhou sitting at the desk thought for a long time, and finally took out a letter paper and wrote on it with a pen.

【

... The changes brought about by quantum computers in the field of communication technology will be subversive.

The encryption and decryption methods of communication technology have always been in a state of dynamic equilibrium development, but now the breakthrough of topological quantum computing technology has broken this balance between offense and defense.

It only takes a few seconds to decrypt a problem encrypted by traditional asymmetric public key.

Once this technology is popularized, while bringing great development to our society, it will also bring huge security risks.

The most urgent task now is that we must establish a set of stricter and more reliable encryption algorithms as a replacement for the original encryption method.

A quantum encryption algorithm similar to the bb84 protocol is a good choice, but it will still be powerless in the face of a quantum computer with more than 1,000 qubits.

In my opinion, quantum computer technology with more than 1,000 qubits can be broken through in a short period of time.

Therefore, this new encryption rule must be more reliable than the bb48 protocol, and it must even exceed its improved version BBM92.

Once this new encryption technology is mastered, it is the best time to promote the commercialization of quantum computers.

And by that time, we will have information technology advantages that other countries cannot match.

Just like the advantages that controllable fusion technology has established for us in the energy field.

】

After he stopped writing, Lu Zhou found an envelope from the drawer, stuffed the letter into it, and threw it on the corner of the table.

When he goes to Jinda tomorrow, he will throw it to Wang Peng and ask him to find someone to take it to Chang'an Street in Shangjing.

Although he felt that even if he didn't say anything, Director Li would definitely report to the higher-ups, but on this kind of issue, sometimes experts' opinions are more effective, and it is easier to attract the attention of the higher-ups.

Although these things are not something a scholar needs to worry about, if possible, Lu Zhou still hopes that his research results can bring some positive impacts to the world instead of pushing it in a bad direction.

Although this may not be as exciting as doing scientific research itself.

But it's also part of the fun.