• Question: Could you use glass instead of diamonds, as glass is cheaper?

    Asked by monika97 to Philip on 13 Jun 2011. This question was also asked by bringmeendlesssummer.
    • Photo: Philip Dolan

      Philip Dolan answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      No, I’m afraid not. The diamond is pretty essential. It’s actually a defect in the diamond. Diamond in normally just carbon atoms bonded very regularly, but if you put nitrogen in there as well it can make the diamond look pink. It is actually these nitrogen atoms we look at, but they’re only pink if they’re in diamond.

Comments

  • Photo: monika97

    monika97 commented on :

    Thank you very much for your answer! I was wandering, you mentioned this material to be in two states (0 and 1 simultaneously) but are there materials which can be in more than two states? If it would be possible, we could have a decimal computer!

  • Photo: Philip

    Philip commented on :

    Hehe – you’re quite right. There is absolutely nothing stopping us having an electron stuck in 3 separate states. It turns out though that although it’s pretty tough to get something in 2 states it’s really really hard to get it into three (although none the less possible). Good point though.