Topological superconductivity holds promise for fault-tolerant quantum computing | Physics



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A team of physicists from New York University, Wayne State University and the University of Buffalo has discovered experimental evidence of a transition between trivial and topological superconductivity in a quantum mechanical device called Josephson junction. This breakthrough offers promising prospects for increasing the storage capacity of electronic devices and improving quantum computing.

Mayer et al. Experimentally show in Josephson junctions a transition between trivial and topological superconductivity. Image credit: GamOl.

Mayer et al experimentally show at Josephson junctions a transition between trivial and topological superconductivity. Image credit: GamOl.

"This new topological state can be manipulated to accelerate computing in quantum computing and increase storage," said Dr. Javad Shabani, a physicist at New York University.

"Our work is focused on quantum computing – a method to perform computations at speeds well above those of conventional computing."

This is because conventional computers treat digital bits as 0s and 1s, while quantum computers deploy qubits to tab any value between 0 and 1, thereby exponentially increasing the capacity and speed of data processing."

In the research, Dr. Shabani and his colleagues analyzed a topological phase transition, measuring the energy barrier between the two states.

They then completed by directly measuring the signature characteristics of this transition in the order parameter that governs the new phase of superconductivity topology.

"Here we focused the investigation on Majorana fermions," explain the researchers.

"We see value in these particles because of their potential for storing quantum information in a special computing space where quantum information is protected from the noise of the environment."

"As a result, we sought to design platforms on which these calculations could be made."

"The new discovery of topological superconductivity in a two-dimensional platform paves the way for the construction of evolutionary topological qubits to store not only quantum information, but also to manipulate quantum states without error," said Dr. Shabani.

The team's work has been published on arXiv.org.

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William Mayer et al. 2019. Phase signature of the topological transition in Josephson junctions. arXiv: 1906.01179

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