From: "Robert Rothenburg 'Walking-Owl'" <WlkngOwl@unix.asb.com>
Date: Mon, 27 Jan 1997 19:55:53 -0800 (PST)
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Infinite Improbability Drive?
Message-ID: <199701280416.XAA02142@unix.asb.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain



Am I reading this correctly, or will the 'infinite improbability 
drive' be invented real soon now? (An odd coincidence after the Tesla 
thread too...)

--Rob

> Edupage, 26 January 1997.  Edupage, a summary of news about information
> technology, is provided three times a week as a service by Educom,
> a Washington, D.C.-based consortium of leading colleges and universities
> seeking to transform education through the use of information technology.

[..]

> COMPUTER IN A COFFEE CUP
> While a conventional computer stores its bits of information by assuming one
> of two possible states (a 1 or a 0), a quantum computer theoretically could
> store much more information by using all the potential states of anatom.
> Scientists are now proposing a new way to harness the power of quantum
> computing, using nuclear magnetic resonance devices to control the movement
> of millions of atoms within an evenly heated volume of material.  By
> coordinating the nuclear spin of the particles, physicists could make them
> act collectively as qubits (quantum bits).  A liquid with the rightthermal
> properties (such as coffee, which is known for its unusually evenheating
> characteristics) could hold up to 10 qubits, but scientists are still
> looking for ways to create a liquid computer that could hold up to 40 qubits
> -- perhaps out of "a really expensive cup of structured coffee," says a
> University of California, Santa Barbara researcher.  (Science News 18 Jan 97
> p37)