Towards a table top quantum computer

Abstract

In the early 1990s, quantum computing proved to be an enticing theoretical possibility but a extremely difficult experimental challenge. Two advances have made experimental quantum computing demonstrable: Quantum error correction; and bulk, thermal quantum computing using nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR). Simple algorithms have been implemented on large, commercial NMR spectrometers that are expensive and cumbersome. The goal of this project is to construct a table-top quantum computer that can match and eventually exceed the performance of commercial machines. This computer should be an inexpensive, easy-to-use machine that can be considered more a computer than its "supercomputer" counterparts. For this thesis, the goal is to develop a low-cost, table-top quantum computer capable of implementing simple quantum algorithms demonstrated thus far in the community, but is also amenable to the many scaling issues of practical quantum computing. Understanding these scaling issues requires developing a theoretical understanding of the signal enhancement techniques and fundamental noise sources of this powerful but delicate system. Complementary to quantum computing, this high performance but low cost NMR machine will be useful for a number of medical, low cost sensing and tagging applications due the unique properties of NMR: the ability to sense and manipulate the information content of materials on macroscopic and microscopic scales.