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In superconducting quantum computers, we use mostly superconducting qubits or trapped ions. However, those systems are quite large because their environment either requires near absolute zero temperature (for superconducting to happen), or vacuum (to trap ions). Also, they need a lot of shielding from the outside world. So I was wondering why aren't we manufacturing QCs with silicon photonics, which would reduce the system size to possibly today's sizes? There is an optical equivalent to Josephson effect (since we use Josephson Junction's effect for superconducting QC) shown here, but why haven't we built more QCs around that? I get that light is harder to interfere with than electrons, so could that result in potential higher qubit error rate?

Edit: I was made aware of Xanadu, but the question still stands. Why are more companies pursuing other forms of quantum computation?

Thanks.

Sanchayan Dutta
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Aleksandar Kostovic
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1 Answers1

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Photon loss is the main obstacle for silicon-photonic quantum computers.

A manufacturable platform for photonic quantum computing records >=99% fidelities for the ingredients needed to build a fusion-based quantum computer but those reported fidelities don't account for photon loss. The fidelities that account for photon loss are unfortunately not public.

Victory Omole
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