Physicists Designed a Quantum Graph Search Technique That Matches Google
Referencing Google’s PageRank algorithm for searching over the internet, the author’s explore a recent study done by physicists published in Physical Review A. Rather than employing the traditional random walk method, the researchers enlisted subatomic particles as “searchers” which explored the traditional graph by exploiting interference effects between particles. To some degree the quantum approach worked. When identifying equivalent sets of nodes it outperformed the traditional “random-walk” approach. Allow the article put forth that this method is far from being a realistic approach, the outlook is enthusiastic for enlisting the factors of nature which seem the most random, in a structured system.
Relating this back to PageRank, this new method employs a technique similar to that of the “random-walk” used to explored a graph and evaluate websites within the structure of the total graph. However, this technique could be seen as a more efficient way of exploring and ranking these pages as it uses the naturally occuring randomness of subatomic particles rather than a “generated” randomness. Further developments into methods similar to the one described in the article could allow search engines not only to search faster, but to find results more accurate and with higher priority to what the user was trying to search.