Japanese researchers begin operating room-temperature quantum computer

Researchers in Japan have begun operating Shunkai, a neutral-atom quantum computer with the hardware, controls and software needed to accept a request and return a result. It will initially run with around 50 qubits. Focused lasers hold and rearrange atoms in a vacuum chamber, while light or microwaves manipulate their quantum states, allowing the system to operate at room temperature. The team plans to open part of Shunkai to outside researchers and connect it to a shared supercomputing facility. Its target of 10,000 physical qubits with error correction by March 2031 is a future goal, not the machine's current capacity.