Researchers at The Australian National University (ANU) say they have stopped light in an experiment which could bring quantum computing closer to reality.
Lead researcher Jesse Everett from the Research School of Physics and Engineering (RSPE) discovered the potential to stop light in a computer simulation and then created an experiment which created a light trap by shining infrared lasers into ultra-cold atomic vapour.
"It's clear that the light is trapped, there are photons circulating around the atoms," he said. "The atoms absorbed some of the trapped light, but a substantial proportion of the photons were frozen inside the atomic cloud."
He likened the team's experiment at ANU to a scene from Star Wars: The Force Awakens when the character Kylo Ren used the Force to stop a laser blast mid-air.
"It's pretty amazing to look at a sci-fi movie and say we actually did something that's a bit like that," Everett said.
He said quantum computers based on light could connect easily with communication technology such as optic fibres and had potential applications in fields such as medicine, defence, telecommunications and financial services.
"Optical quantum computing is still a long way off, but our successful experiment to stop light gets us further along the road," he said.
Co-researcher Dr Geoff Campbell from RSPE said photons mostly passed by each other at the speed of light without any interactions, while atoms interacted with each other readily.
"Corralling a crowd of photons in a cloud of ultra-cold atoms creates more opportunities for them to interact," said Campbell.
"We're working towards a single photon changing the phase of a second photon. We could use that process to make a quantum logic gate, the building block of a quantum computer."
Quantum research is moving ahead in leaps and bounds around the country. Last week, UNSW struck a $70 million deal to create a consortium to develop and commercialise technology that could lead to the world’s first quantum computer in silicon.
Earlier this month, $31.9 million funding was announced for the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems at the University of Queensland. This group will focus on designer quantum materials, quantum engines, and quantum imaging systems at the heart of these machines.
[ANU's Geoff Campbell and Jesse Everett. Image: Stuart Hay, ANU]
Innovation will be the subject of a number of presentations at the Australian Engineering Conference 2016 in Brisbane on November 23-25.