We took a step back and said ‘OK, let’s invent the transistor for the quantum age. What properties does it need to have?

Chetan Nayak, microsoft technical fellow

The Science behind Majorana 1

Majorana Fermions are exotic quasiparticles that act as their own antiparticles. Normal Particles like Electrons, when they meet another of their own kind, don’t annihilate each other. On the other hand, Majorana when they meet their antiparticles, annihilate each other.

These Majorana Particles exhibit special behaviour because they obey non-Abelian Statistics. To understand it, we should have an understanding of Quantum Statistics.

Quantum Mechanics Classifies particles based on how they behave when their positions are swapped. Swapping two Bosons (Bosonic Statistics) does nothing to the wave function, whereas swapping two Fermions (Fermionic Statistics) flips the wave function’s sign. Then comes Non-Abelian Statistics, the most Exotic Type. In Non-Abelian Statistics, swapping two identical particles does more than just flip the sign, it actually changes the Quantum State in a way that depends on the order of their exchanges.

Will Majorana 1 be the Game Changer?

These Majorana Particles on Quantum Computing can be special due to their Error Resistance, Topological Protection, and Scalability. These particles are less susceptible to decoherence, the Qubits can store more information, and if proven, Majorana-based Quantum Computers could be easier to scale than the current models.

Take Away

Will Microsoft change the future of Quantum Computing? Well, the Scientific Community remains skeptical about their stability in real-world quantum computing. In 2018, Microsoft claimed to have detected the Majorana particles, however, they later retracted the findings due to a mistake in the data. But this time, it is solid, and if successful, it could surpass Google’s Sycamore and IBM’s Osprey Chips in Quantum Computing.

References

• Majorna based-Quantum Computing – Microsoft
• Non-Abelian Statistics in Condensed Matter Systems – MIT
• Microsoft Azure Blog
• Quasi Particles – Wikipedia