Reusing old computer parts sounds like a terrible way to boost processing power, but it has enabled a quantum computer to set a new algorithmic record. Anthony Laing and colleagues at the University ...

A quantum computer algorithm that is used to find the prime factors in an encryption key. Created by applied mathematician Peter Shor in the mid-1990s, Shor's algorithm may be used to break the codes ...

The rise of quantum computing and its implications for current encryption standards are well known. But why exactly should quantum computers be especially adept at breaking encryption? The answer is a ...

In 1994, MIT professor of applied mathematics Peter Shor developed a groundbreaking quantum computing algorithm capable of factoring numbers (that is, finding the prime numbers for any integer N) ...

This article was published in Scientific American’s former blog network and reflects the views of the author, not necessarily those of Scientific American Peter Shor is a poet. Here is a limerick he ...

When the Robert Redford film Sneakers hit theaters in 1992, most moviegoers had never heard of the Internet. They’d have guessed “World Wide Web” was a horror film involving spiders. And nobody knew ...