Re:Why now is the best time to study quantum computing (2014)
by davorb on Sunday May 01, 2016 @02:35PM
(#11607309)
> are we sure we will not need exponentially more energy or time to get the result of computation
The minimum free energy that must be expended to operate a computer is theoretically very close to zero, since it is not strictly necessary to use irreversible primitives[0], such as NAND gates, which is something that we do in traditional computers. For irreversible elements the theoretical requirement is about kT*ln(2) at temperature T. DNA uses about 100 kT per bit copied.
I really recommend that you take a look at Feynman's introduction to quantum computing[1].
The minimum free energy that must be expended to operate a computer is theoretically very close to zero, since it is not strictly necessary to use irreversible primitives[0], such as NAND gates, which is something that we do in traditional computers. For irreversible elements the theoretical requirement is about kT*ln(2) at temperature T. DNA uses about 100 kT per bit copied.
I really recommend that you take a look at Feynman's introduction to quantum computing[1].
[0] http://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/fall04/cos576/pa...
[1] http://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/fall05/frs119/pa...