X marks the spot: Ions coldly go through NIST trap junction

Physicists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have demonstrated a new ion trap that enables ions to go through an intersection while keeping their cool. Ten million times cooler than in prior similar trips, in fact. The demonstration, described in a forthcoming paper in Physical Review Letters, is a step toward scaling up trap technology to build a large-scale quantum computer using ions (electrically charged atoms), a potentially powerful machine that could perform certain calculations - such as breaking today's best data encryption codes - much faster than today's computers...

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