Work on the first quantum computers has accelerated rapidly in recent years. And although we will have to wait a while for a real quantum revolution in many areas of life, new things are already emerging that give us hope that it will appear sooner than previously expected.
IBM presents a new quantum processor. But there is something even more exciting
The IBM Quantum Heron presented this week is a new quantum processor that is expected to prove useful in utility applications. The company boasts that it is the first model in a completely new series, in which the efficiency has been increased several times and 133 qubits are used (a qubit is the smallest unit of quantum information – the more of them, the better). This is six qubits more than the previous IBM Quantum Eagle model.
that the new processor paid great attention to minimizing the number of errors occurring during calculations, which resulted in a result five times better than its predecessor. Moreover, more processors are to be added to the Quantum Heron series in the coming year, which will further improve the capabilities achieved so far.
The second novelty is IBM Quantum System Two, the first modular quantum computer, which is already located in the research center in Yorktown Heights, New York. The heart of the computer are three Quantum Heron processors (which together have 399 qubits), and the entire structure is fully modular. Quantum System Two is 4.5 meters high and resembles small classic supercomputers. However, in the future it is expected to perform practical calculations that would take too much time with currently existing supercomputers.
The capabilities of Quantum System Two have already been made available to scientists, who can commission an IBM computer to perform calculations using the cloud. The company boasts that by the end of next year, each of the computer’s three processors will be able to perform as many as 5,000. calculations within each cycle. However, a great step towards revolution will be the modularity of this structure. It will be possible to connect subsequent and subsequent segments to the computer, which will result in a real increase in power. The company promises that this will translate into an increase in efficiency to 100 million operations per cycle. At least in the near future, in 2033, the total capabilities of such a system are expected to increase to one billion operations.
Although research on quantum computers has been going on since the 1980s, no company or research institution has yet built a machine that would actually solve practical problems that cannot be solved in any other way. However, work is ongoing, and in addition to IBM, competitors in this field include, among others: Google, Microsoft and Intel. Quantum computers are still too low in performance. It grows exponentially as the number of qubits increases. Perhaps the idea of modular computers from IBM will solve this problem for now.
Source: Gazeta
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