This essential creates a lively and vivid understanding of the processes in quantum computers. It explores the quantum phenomena of entanglement and superposition and how they can be used for computing. Coding of information, explanation of simple algorithms, and possible applications are shown. A glossary at the end of the essentials explains the most important terms.

Beatrice Marie Ellerhoff is a PhD student at the Institute for Environmental Physics in Heidelberg. Already during her physics studies at the University of Heidelberg, she wrote for the blog www.manybodyphysics.com and the Science Notes magazine. She worked for four years as a student assistant at the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in the group of Nobel Prize winner Stefan Hell, among others. In her master thesis she investigated the entanglement of many ultracold quantum particles. As part of her doctorate at the Institute of Environmental Physics, Beatrice Ellerhoff is now turning to the macroscopically tangible world and researching the fundamentals of climate fluctuations on long time scales in Kira Rehfeld's group. She is particularly fascinated by the deep understanding of physical concepts across individual disciplines. In addition to research, running and jazz piano are among her great passions. She is a fellow of the Heidelberg Graduate School for Fundamental Physics.