Google’s New Chip Tackles Quantum Computing’s Error Challenges

Despite the progress in making quantum computers more viable, qubit-based systems remain prone to instability and errors. However, Google may have made a significant breakthrough in addressing this issue.

With the introduction of a new quantum chip called Willow, Google engineers have achieved a major milestone in error correction. They’ve managed to stabilize a single logical qubit, reducing error occurrences to just once every hour—a dramatic improvement over previous systems, which failed every few seconds.

The Role of Qubits in Quantum Computing

Qubits are the fundamental units of quantum computing, differing from classical bits, which can represent a 1 or 0. Qubits, however, can exist in multiple states simultaneously, offering immense potential for solving complex problems that classical computers would struggle with.

However, qubits are highly sensitive, and their quantum properties can easily be disrupted by interactions with the environment. While current systems are reliable to 99.9%, practical quantum computing requires error rates closer to one in a trillion.

To mitigate these errors, researchers can distribute a single logical qubit across multiple physical qubits in superposition. But this only works if the additional qubits correct errors faster than they occur.

Willow: Exponentially Improved Error Correction with Larger Qubits

Willow is the first processor where error-corrected qubits improve exponentially as they increase in size, explain Michael Newman and Kevin Satzinger, Google Quantum AI researchers.

Each time we increase the lattice of encoded qubits from a 3×3 to a 5×5 or 7×7 configuration, the encoded error rate is halved.

Willow features 105 physical qubits, and the combination of its architecture and error-correction algorithms has led to increased stability, meaning that more qubits result in fewer errors.

This problem has been a challenge since quantum error correction methods were first introduced in the 1990s. While quantum computing still has a long way to go, this development signals that large-scale quantum operations might soon become feasible.

This demonstrates the exponential error suppression that quantum error correction has promised for nearly 30 years and is a crucial step toward realizing large-scale quantum applications, say Newman and Satzinger.

Google claims that Willow can complete a quantum task in five minutes, a task that would take one of the fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years. Although designers specifically designed this task for quantum computers, it demonstrates Willow’s potential and extends its benefits beyond stability.

Completing Quantum Tasks in Minutes

While errors will always be present in quantum systems, the goal is to make them rare enough to make quantum computing practical. Achieving this will require more advanced hardware, additional qubits, and improved algorithms.

Quantum error correction appears to be working, but there’s still a significant gap between today’s error rates of one in a thousand and the one-in-a-trillion rates needed for the future, say Newman and Satzinger.

Read the original article on: Science Alert

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