Microsoft edges closer to quantum computer based on elusive particle

FILE - This April 12, 2016, file photo shows the Microsoft logo in Issy-les-Moulineaux, outside Paris, France. The budget bill before Congress includes an update to federal law that makes clear that authorities with a warrant can obtain emails and other data held by U.S. technology companies but stored on servers overseas. Passage of the Cloud Act probably would end a Supreme Court dispute between Microsoft and the Trump administration over emails the U.S. wants as part of a drug trafficking investigation. (AP Photo/Michel Euler, File)

At Microsoft Corp's Dutch research facility at the Delft University of Technology, several large cylindrical metal tubes hang from the ceiling. 

Each tube – a dilution refrigerator used to cool circuits down to temperatures colder than deep space – costs more than US$500,000 (RM1.93mil), and has helped Microsoft's researchers create an elusive subatomic particle that the company hopes will serve as the building block of its effort to create commercially-viable quantum computers.