Relativistic Quantum Computing

We present some informal remarks on aspects of relativistic quantum computing. The continuing miniaturization of electronic circuitry has forced designers of computer chips to deal with all of the complications that are entailed in using Quantum Mechanics. Meanwhile, physicists have identified dramatic new possibilities for increases in computer performance by making use of such uniquely quantum effects as superposition, the entanglement of states, and the collapse of wave functions during measurement. Quantum computation and quantum information theory have now become exciting new fields of research. As circuits become yet smaller and the demand for higher clock speeds continues to escalate, relativistic effects, as well as quantum effects, will become important in computing. The energy-time uncertainty relation in Quantum Mechanics places a number of interesting bounds on the performance of computers. We shall show that as faster computer circuits are developed, a series of thresholds is encountered, each requiring major changes of engineering approach. Eventually , in order to design the very fastest computer circuits, engineers will be forced to deal with the full machinery of Relativistic Quantum Field Theory, which is today used mainly by high energy physicists who study relativistic particle collisions. Let us pause to think back to the level of technology available to engineers in the early part of the twentieth century at the time that Einstein proposed his theory of the specific heat of solids. Just after his theory was proposed,