The God Machine: Labs race to build "quantum" computers which could save millions of lives

In laboratories around the world, researchers and defence companies are already testing a new kind of computer - one which will end the age of silicon chips, and could save millions of lives.

Labs are racing to create a machine that would instantly be the most powerful ever created - capable of cracking any code, and solving any maths problem.

IBM predict that within our lifetimes, a computer will be able to hold as much information as there are atoms in the universe.

Speaking to Yahoo, Colin Stuart, author of The Big Questions in science says that a fully functioning quantum computer could save millions of lives - by inventing drugs in seconds, while at the moment, PCs and supercomputers labour for years.

The key? A phenomenon Einstein himself described as “spooky” - where tiny “entangled” particles can be both there and not there at the same time.