Influence of imperfections on the dynamical response in model quantum cellular automata

The time-dependent behavior of quantum cellular automata (QCA) with imperfections is examined. We have studied a chain of quantum cells with the imperfections introduced by (i) variations of intercellular distances, (ii) variations of intercell tunneling strengths, and (iii) stray charges. We find that imperfections like these may easily impair the switching properties of semiconductor based QCAs.