Timeline of Quantum Computing - 1980s

1980s

• 1981
  • Richard Feynman in his talk at the First Conference on the Physics of Computation, held at MIT in May, observed that it appeared to be impossible in general to simulate an evolution of a quantum system on a classical computer in an efficient way. He proposed a basic model for a quantum computer that would be capable of such simulations
  • Tommaso Toffoli introduced the reversible Toffoli gate, which, together with the NOT and XOR gates provides a universal set for classical computation.

• 1982 – Paul Benioff proposes the first recognisable theoretical framework for a quantum computer

• 1984 – Charles Bennett and Gilles Brassard employ Wiesner's conjugate coding for distribution of cryptographic keys.

• 1985 – David Deutsch, at the University of Oxford, described the first universal quantum computer. Just as a Universal Turing machine can simulate any other Turing machine efficiently, so the universal quantum computer is able to simulate any other quantum computer with at most a polynomial slowdown.