On 4 December, IBMs new Quantum Chip called Condo with 1,121 superconducting qubits arranged in a honeycomb pattern was revealed. It follows on from its other record-setting, bird-named machines, including a 127-qubit chip in 2021 and a 433-qubit one last year.
IBM also unveiled a chip called Heron that has 133 qubits, but with a record-low error rate, three times lower than that of its previous quantum processor. Researchers have generally said that state-of-the-art error-correction techniques will require more than 1,000 physical qubits for each logical qubit. A machine that can do useful computations would then need to have millions of physical qubits.
But in recent months, physicists have grown excited about an alternative error-correction scheme called quantum low-density parity check (qLDPC). It promises to cut that number by a factor of 10 or more, according to a preprint by IBM researchers. The company says it will now focus on building chips designed to hold a few qLDPC-corrected qubits in just 400 or so physical qubits, and then networking those chips together.
The qLDPC technique requires each qubit to be directly connected to at least six others. In typical superconducting chips, each qubit is connected only to two or three neighbors. But Oliver Dial, a condensed-matter physicist and chief technology officer of IBM Quantum, at IBM’s Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York, says that the company has a plan: it will add a layer to the design of its quantum chips, to allow the extra connections required by the qLDPC scheme.
In October, Atom Computing announced it has created a 1,225-site atomic array, currently populated with 1,180 qubits, in its next-generation quantum computing platform.
This is the first time a company has crossed the 1,000-qubit threshold for a universal gate-based system, planned for release next year. It marks an industry milestone toward fault-tolerant quantum computers capable of solving large-scale problems.
The new 1,225-qubit quantum computer uses ytterbium-171 atoms to create its qubits.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
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