A consortium led by US-based technology giant IBM, together with Japan's RIKEN research institute, the University of Chicago, and software companies, announced that the goal of 'quantum advantage' has been reached. Three separate research studies demonstrated that current noisy and error-prone quantum hardware can outperform the world's most powerful supercomputers and produce verifiable results.
In one study conducted by IBM and RIKEN, the system was tested by simulating periodic transitions in magnetic lattices, known as the Ising model. This complex calculation was also run on Japan's Fugaku supercomputer, which held the title of the world's most powerful computer five years ago. While classical algorithms produced erroneous and contradictory results over time, the IBM quantum processor equipped with special error-reduction software provided stable data fully compatible with physics.
The IBM-RIKEN study was one of three demonstrating quantum advantage.
The accuracy achieved by the IBM quantum processor was verified by Quantinuum, an independent quantum system. A second study, conducted through a collaboration between the University of Chicago and IBM, used special quantum gates (T gates) that classical computers cannot replicate. The research team created a security network that uses additional qubits placed around the system to instantly detect errors and filter erroneous data during computation.
The verifiability of quantum results where classical simulations are impossible is a historic achievement.
In a third study, the company Algorithmiq applied a 'quantum echo' technique that completely isolates the noise factor in the system. Scientists managed to process data of a complexity unreachable by classical hardware without errors by selecting the most stable areas on the processor and reducing the noise rate below a calculable limit. Current quantum algorithms are not yet used directly in daily commercial applications.