Pierre Desjardins (C12 Quantum Electronics): Carbon nanotubes as a new qubit platform

Key takeaways

  • C12 builds qubits from suspended carbon nanotubes acting as ultra-clean quantum dots, aiming for longer coherence than standard silicon spin qubits
  • The company designs its own custom fabrication process rather than relying on standard semiconductor foundries, since nanotube placement and suspension require specialized techniques
  • Application-specific quantum chips, tailored to a particular problem rather than general purpose, could reach useful performance with far fewer qubits
  • Spin qubits in carbon nanotubes can operate at higher temperatures than superconducting qubits, which simplifies the cooling infrastructure needed

Summary

Pierre Desjardins, co-founder and CEO of C12 Quantum Electronics, a company using carbon nanotubes to create a new quantum architecture, is interviewed by Yuval Boger. Pierre and Yuval talk about C12’s unique technology, what carbon nanotubes are, designing custom application-specific quantum chips, and much more.

Read the full transcript on the Quantum Computing Report