In a study published in the journal Physical Review X , the research team theoretically demonstrated how a tiny quantum battery could power a quantum computer, quadrupling the number of quantum bytes (known as qubits), the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Australia's national science agency, said in a press release on Thursday (January 29).
The computer uses much less energy because the internal quantum battery can recycle energy within the system, said James Quach, one of the study's authors and a quantum battery research leader at CSIRO.
"Quantum batteries are tiny yet incredibly powerful," Quach said, adding that the discovery brings quantum computing closer to solving energy, cooling, and infrastructure challenges by providing computers with an internal "fuel tank" that can recharge itself during operation, a significant advance in the field of quantum energy.
Quantum computers rely on the laws of quantum physics to solve problems that could transform computing, medicine, energy, finance, communications, and many others in the coming years, but maintaining their highly fragile quantum states requires large, energy-intensive cryogenic coolers that must be equipped with room-temperature electronics.
These constraints are major obstacles to scale-up, qubit growth, and market launch.
A quantum battery is a device that can store energy using light, allowing sufficient recharge by exposure to light, and can be recharged by the machine's own components when integrated into a quantum computer.
