Quantum Technology China "Fast Forward"
In the field of quantum technology, a fierce competition is unfolding.
Quantum communication, quantum computing, quantum calculation...Nowadays, quantum technology has become the frontier of a new round of scientific and technological revolution and industrial transformation in which the global technological powers concentrate their efforts.
To seize the opportunity of quantum technology development, China has pressed the "fast forward button."
Experts pointed out that, as a strategic area related to national security and high-quality social and economic development, the innovation initiative and development initiative of quantum technology must be firmly in their hands.
The magical "entanglement" and "superposition"
Quantum refers to the indivisible basic unit of matter.
In layman's terms, if you divide energy and other physical quantities into smaller pieces that cannot be divided into smaller pieces, it is quantum.
For example, light quantum is the basic unit of light energy, and it cannot be divided into half and 1/3 photons.
In fact, the molecules, atoms, and electrons we have learned in physics classes are all different manifestations of quantum.
In 1900, German physicist Max Planck proposed quantum theory, which opened the branch of physics to study the laws of microscopic particle motion in the material world.
Over the past 120 years, several generations of scientists around the world have worked diligently to expand their boundaries in the fields of quantum theory, quantum technology and their applications.
In the macroscopic world, Newtonian classical mechanics can help us understand and measure the laws of motion and speed of objects.
But in the quantum microcosm, many rules are completely different from our cognition.
The two basic principles are "superposition" and "entanglement".
The principle of superposition, the most classic theory is the mysterious "Schrodinger's Cat".
According to the theory of quantum mechanics, matter can simultaneously exist in multiple states and "superpositions" of multiple locations on the microscopic scale.
In order to explain the superposition state, the Austrian physicist Schrödinger proposed a classic theory in 1935: put a cat in a box containing a small amount of radium and cyanide. If the radium decays, it will trigger the organ to break the cyanide. The cat will die if you lose the bottle; otherwise, the cat will survive.
In the quantum world, because the radioactive radium is in the superposition of the two states of decay and no decay, the "poor" cat is in the superposition of a dead cat and a live cat.
What's even more amazing is that if you want to measure quantum, it will change from a superposition state to a certain state, just like if someone opens the box with curiosity, only one dead cat or alive cat will be seen.
A quantum can "superpose" multiple states, and multiple quanta will produce a wonderful reaction of "entanglement".
Two particles in a state of quantum entanglement are like the telepathy of twins.
No matter how far apart, when the state of one quantum changes, the other quantum will also change super "instantly".
For the weird entanglement phenomenon, Einstein was also difficult to explain at the time, calling it "ghostly super-distance effect."
More than one hundred years after the birth of quantum theory, it has given birth to many major inventions, and technologies such as nuclear energy, lasers, and semiconductors have emerged, and have developed major applications such as computers, the Internet, and mobile phones, which have changed the progress of human civilization.
Today, the development of quantum technology has great scientific significance and strategic value. It is a major disruptive technological innovation that impacts and reconstructs the traditional technological system, and will lead a new round of technological revolution and industrial transformation.
Quantum communication "Mozi" leads
In August 2016, China launched the world's first space quantum science experimental satellite, "Mozi" independently developed.
"Nature" magazine once commented that in the field of quantum communication, it took less than 10 years for China to develop from a humble country into a powerful force in the world, which will lead Europe and North America.
Quantum communication is a key quantum technology field that is prioritized by all countries.
In the traditional communication method, the encryption method relies on the "complexity" of the calculation, and there is a risk of eavesdropping.
The unique characteristics of quantum give it "innate advantages" such as unclonability and uncertainty.
Using quantum-made "keys" to transmit information, the encrypted content will not be deciphered, and eavesdroppers will inevitably be "captured."
Quantum communication is therefore regarded as a "protection shield" for the secure transmission of information, providing a solution for breaking the "bottlenecks" of information encryption.
In recent years, China's quantum communication technology has made many breakthroughs.
The launch of the "Mozi" provides the possibility of "quantum secret transmission" through space.
Experiments show that the transmission efficiency of satellite-to-earth quantum keys is 1 trillion times higher than terrestrial fiber channels at a communication distance of 1,200 kilometers. Satellites send 40 million signal photons per second on average, and one experiment can generate 300 kilobits (kbit). The average bit rate is 1.1 kilobits per second (kbps).
At the same time, Chinese researchers have also used quantum satellites to successfully achieve the first thousand kilometers of satellite-to-ground two-way quantum entanglement distribution in the world.
In 2017, the world's first quantum secure communication backbone network "Beijing-Shanghai Mainline" project passed the general technical acceptance.
This year, Chinese scientists have also achieved many results in the field of quantum communication——
In March, the Pan Jianwei team of the University of Science and Technology of China and other researchers realized the dual-field quantum key distribution and phase-matched quantum key distribution of a 500-kilometer-level real environment fiber, with a transmission distance of 509 kilometers, setting a new world record.
In May, the Chinese scientific research team published a paper in the international physics authoritative journal "Modern Physics Review", systematically expounding the principles, theories and experimental techniques of quantum cryptography, laying the foundation for the wide application and standardization of quantum cryptography.
In September of this year, the team of Academician Guo Guangcan cooperated with his Austrian counterparts to achieve a high-fidelity 32-dimensional quantum entangled state for the first time, significantly increasing the channel capacity of quantum communication and creating the world's highest level.
Quantum computing takes the lead
Quantum computing is also a field of quantum technology that countries are competing to deploy.
Compared with traditional computers, quantum computers have unique advantages.
The operating unit bits of traditional computers have only two states: 0 and 1.
In quantum computers, due to the existence of quantum superposition states, one qubit can record both states 0 and 1.
If the number of quanta manipulated by a computer increases, the computing speed of the computer will increase exponentially, and the computing power potential is huge.
With the improvement of computing power, many areas of social life are expected to usher in a "revolution"—increasing crop yields, guiding scientific urban transportation planning, promoting research and development of new drugs, and achieving high-precision weather forecasts... Experts say that quantum computing will Greatly promote the current development of artificial intelligence and its applications, and profoundly change many fields including basic education.
In recent years, in the field of quantum computing, various technologically advanced countries in the world have competed with each other. Companies such as IBM, Google, and Microsoft are chasing after each other to achieve more qubit manipulation through different technological paths.
In October last year, Google researchers published a paper in the journal Nature, claiming that they have successfully demonstrated "quantum hegemony", allowing quantum systems to complete tasks that would take 10,000 years for traditional supercomputers to complete in about 200 seconds.
The so-called "quantum hegemony" means that the computing power of a quantum computer on a particular problem exceeds that of a traditional computer, and it solves complex problems that cannot be solved by a traditional computer within a reasonable time frame.
Although many parties still have doubts about Google's research results, there is no doubt that quantum computers are close to surpassing the computing power and application prospects of traditional computers.
Through the efforts of scientists to catch up, in the field of quantum computing, China as a whole is at the same level as developed countries.
In recent years, many scientific research teams have achieved initial results in the field of quantum computing.
At the end of last year, Pan Jianwei and other scholars cooperated with scientists in Germany and the Netherlands to realize the Bose sampling quantum calculation of the 20-photon input 60×60 mode interference circuit for the first time in the world. The four key indicators have greatly set international records and are approaching realization. The important goal of quantum computing research is "quantum hegemony".
In terms of enterprises, technology companies such as Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent, and Huawei have also introduced quantum computing research plans.
In September of this year, the 6-bit superconducting quantum computing cloud platform independently developed by Chinese companies was officially launched. Global users can experience quantum computing services from China online.
Strategic layout has become a global consensus
Currently, the integration of scientific and technological resources in the field of quantum science and technology and the concentration of forces for breakthroughs have formed a broad consensus among major developed countries.
The governments, scientific research institutions, and industrial capital of developed countries in Europe and the United States are accelerating their strategic deployment, greatly increasing R&D investment, and launching a strong impact on China’s local leading advantages.
In Europe, as early as 2016, the European Union announced that quantum technology would be a new flagship scientific research project to welcome the "second quantum revolution."
Germany recently stated that it plans to build the country's first quantum computer in 2021 and promote the application of related new technologies in the industrial field in 5 to 10 years.
The United States launched the "National Quantum Action Act" in 2018.
In July of this year, the U.S. Department of Energy announced the strategic blueprint for the development of the quantum Internet, proposing to ensure that the United States is at the forefront of the global quantum race and lead a new era of communications.
Recently, the United States has also opened the website of the National Office of Quantum Coordination and released the "Quantum Frontier Report" focusing on eight research fields.
In order to strengthen its scientific and technological strength, Japan announced this year that its Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology will make substantial adjustments to accelerate basic research and research and development of cutting-edge technologies with increasingly fierce international competition.
Among them, the establishment of special institutions to promote scientific research, unified management of emerging fields including quantum technology.
In addition, Japan's domestic research institutions and universities have also begun to make great efforts to cultivate "quantum talents" who will shoulder the future.
In recent years, Chinese scientific and technological workers have been catching up in quantum technology and have achieved a number of major innovations with international influence.
After more than 30 years of hard work, China has emerged as an important force on the international quantum scientific research landscape, leading or entering the first camp in multiple strategic directions.
In this regard, Pan Jianwei pointed out that quantum technology is a strategic area related to national security and high-quality social and economic development, and innovation initiative and development initiative must be firmly in their own hands.
In particular, it is necessary to face long-term goals and integrate superior resources to form a systematic capability for independent innovation through top-level design and forward-looking layout at the national level.
Liu Yao