How Google's Quantum Computer Could Change the World

Neven, who speaks with a thick German accent and favors pink Christian Louboutin sneakers covered in spikes, has led some of Google's most groundbreaking projects, from image-recognition software to Google Glass, a consumer flop that pioneered the idea of head-worn computers. The task in front of him is the most complex of his career: Build a computer based on the strange laws of quantum mechanics. There is no quick explanation of quantum mechanics, but the Cliffs Notes version goes something like this: Scientists have proved that atoms can exist in two states at once, a phenomenon called superposition. A single atom, for example, can be in two locations at the same time. Superposition gets even stranger as it scales.