My latest at Forbes: Researchers at Kyoto University, the University of Tokyo and KEK are using quantum computers to hunt for dark matter. The approach takes advantage of quantum processors’ extreme sensitivity to external interference, the very thing that normally makes them so hard to engineer, and turns it into a detection mechanism.
Dark matter could account for as much as 85% of the universe’s mass, but decades of underground detectors, particle accelerators and astrophysical observatories haven’t produced a direct detection. Quantum computers, which operate in environments engineered to eliminate nearly all external noise, may be sensitive enough to catch a signal that conventional instruments miss.
It’s a genuinely creative application of a technology most people associate with cryptography and optimization. Using the most isolated computing systems ever built to search for the most elusive substance in the universe is the kind of idea that sounds obvious in hindsight. We’ll see if it works.