May 20, 2014 6:30 AM

Gallery: The Future of Quantum Computing Could Depend on This Tricky Qubit

Photo: John Smock for Quanta Magazine
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Willett working in the clean metallization lab, where gallium arsenide crystals are coated with metal.
Photo: John Smock for Quanta Magazine
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Bob Willett has worked at Bell Labs for 25 years, spending the last few toiling seven days a week toward the goal of building a topological qubit.

Photo: John Smock for Quanta Magazine
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Willett and Gerardo Gamez with a new molecular beam epitaxy machine, which is used to grow ultra-pure gallium arsenide crystals.
Photo: John Smock for Quanta Magazine
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Willet points to a diagram that illustrates how metal is patterned onto a crystal.

Photos by John Smock for Quanta Magazine
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Willett with a tank of liquid helium, which he uses to cool his gallium arsenide wafers to a few hundredths of a degree above absolute zero.
Photo: John Smock for Quanta Magazine
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An integrated circuit made of metal deposited on an ultra-pure gallium arsenide crystal — a possible precursor to a topological qubit.

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