Google developers achieved a breakthrough in quantum computing

They managed to develop a system that can significally reduce the error rate without affecting the information carried by the qubits.

Quantum computer systems could perform calculations that would be complicated or imposible for conventional computers we use nowadays. However, the practical application of the technology is currently under the question due to many errors in the system.

This time, the developers found an approach for creating the technology so that it fixes those errors without affecting the transmitted information. The Google Quantum AI lab published results in the journal Nature.

The developers admit that the result of the system is not ideal, but it is still the first example of the success of such a system — until now, attempts to correct errors led rather to their increase.

Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, stated in his message:

Our breakthrough represents a significant shift in how we operate quantum computers. Instead of working on the physical qubits on our quantum processor one by one, we are treating a group of them as one logical qubit. As a result, a logical qubit that we made from 49 physical qubits was able to outperform one we made from 17 qubits.

In our conventional computers the information is encoded in bits that can be represented in 0 or 1. Quantum computers use qubits, which can be a combination of both at the same time. So, these quantum machines could be much powerful than existing ones.