An ion is a charged atom.
Here we see two of them: 
a calcium and a strontium ion.
They are superb controllable quantum systems,
and we'll see we can store information into either one.
Suppose our strontium is initially in state zero.
We can apply a pulse of energy to switch it to state one.
Later, for readout, we can use a laser
that would have no effect on state zero,
but our ion in state one will absorb energy
and then emit it back as a photon,
a particle of light which we can detect.
Let's zoom out. We see gold strips below.
These produce electric fields
holding our ions still without physically touching them,
and again we see a laser causing an ion
to become excited and emit its photon.
Zooming out further we see the gold strips
are part of a small chip called an ion trap,
and then we see surrounding
electrical and cooling systems.
A final zoom reveals the entire system is encased
in a vacuum chamber,
which protects it from the atmosphere.
Surrounding the vacuum chamber are
laser systems, field coils
and crucially a photonic link system
to capture the photons into an optical fiber.
This complete module is a small quantum processor,
but now consider two linked  modules.
When photons meet at the entangler unit in the middle,
the ions that created those photons
become quantum entangled
and so the two modules combine
as a single quantum machine.
Extending this idea
we can have an entire array of modules.
We can switch connections
so that a module links either to a nearby neighbour
or to another far away.
In this way we can have a highly connected
and scalable quantum brain.
