Merging atomic clocks with quantum computers could lead to ultraprecise measurements of laws of nature

Physicists like to measure things, and they like those measurements to be as precise as possible. That means working at unfathomably small scales, where distances are much smaller than even the diameters of subatomic particles. Researchers also want to measure time down to a precision of less than one second per tens of billions of years. The quest for these ultraprecise measurements in physics is part of a growing field called quantum metrology.