Google has launched its latest quantum computing chip called Willow.
The tech giant's announcement comes as the race to bring quantum computers to market heats up, with companies including IBM, Microsoft, Amazon and Nvidia investing billions in the next-gen technology. Google says that because more qubits are used at once, Willow can significantly reduce errors or interruptions at the quantum level during computation.
“Errors are one of the biggest challenges in quantum computing. Computational units in quantum computers tend to exchange information rapidly with their surroundings, making it difficult to maintain the information needed to complete a calculation.” In a statement by Hartmut Neven, founder and leader of Google Quantum AI. “Typically, the more qubits you use, the more errors occur, and the system becomes classical,” meaning the system loses its quantum properties like superposition and entanglement, often due to quantum noise.
By solving this major challenge in quantum error correction, Google aims to make quantum computers reliable and practical enough to be used in a production environment.
Long touted as the next big technological breakthrough, quantum computers could better solve problems ranging from climate modeling to discovering new drugs and string theory. Quantum computers can break commonly used encryption schemes such as RSA, and as such could pose a threat to blockchain-based systems.
“Error correction is big for quantum computing in general, and what corrects errors for them is the time of cooperation. Dr. Eric Garcell, Director of Quantum Enterprise Development at Classic, told Decrypt that they were able to make their stature taller. “You're not adding as much noise as your calculations, and that's a huge improvement over superconducting qubits.”
What is a quantum computer?
Unlike classical computers, which process information using bits (0s and 1s), quantum computers use qubits, which can exist in a higher state – representing 0, 1 or both at the same time. This unique property allows quantum computers to perform many calculations simultaneously and explore many possibilities much faster than a traditional silicon-based computer.
Entanglement allows quantum computers to solve classical problems by connecting qubits so that their states are interconnected.
Business implications of quantum computing
Google's advances with Willow aren't just theoretical, Garcell says. They are setting the stage for quantum computers to enter the business world in the next few years.
“The fact that Google is able to advance quantum computing with Willow makes it possible to use quantum computers commercially in the next two to three years,” Dr. Garcell said. “The growth that Google is putting into it accelerates my personal view of when Quantum will start providing value to companies. People are already figuring out how to place these machines next to their high-performance computers.
Google tested Willow in the 2019 Quantum AI division's Random Circuit Sampling benchmark. This benchmark measures the performance of a quantum computer against a classical computer. While Willow's success represents significant progress, Google admits that the next challenge is making “useful, non-classical” computing relevant to real-world applications.
“Really, the bottom line is when it starts making people money,” Garcel said. “People are going to find out, does it make more sense to use a classical computer or a quantum computer? And at the end of the day, that's the metric we use.
Edited by Josh Quittner and Sebastian Sinclair
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