In a major development in quantum computing, Colorado-based Quantinuum has successfully entangled 50 logical qubits, setting new industry records. The breakthrough was announced by David Hayes, the company's Director of Computational Theory and Design, during a plenary session at the Q2B conference in Silicon Valley.
This achievement surpasses the previous record of 24 logical qubits demonstrated jointly by Microsoft and Atom Computing just last month. It also edges past QuEra Computing and Harvard University's recent milestone of 48 logical qubits.
The development marks two key records - the highest number of entangled logical qubits and the largest quantum computer using logical qubits. This progress is particularly notable as logical qubits, which are groups of physical qubits, are central to reducing computation errors in quantum systems.
While companies have been building computers with thousands of physical qubits, the ability to implement error correction through logical qubits remains a critical challenge. Quantinuum's system can currently detect errors but cannot correct them - an important distinction highlighted by Hayes during the announcement.
The path to practical quantum computing requires three main elements: capable hardware, robust control software, and integrated hardware-software solutions for specific applications. Quantinuum's latest achievement addresses the hardware component, but work continues on the remaining challenges.
This development comes amid intensifying competition in quantum computing, with companies investing billions to create fault-tolerant systems that could eventually surpass today's most powerful supercomputers. Different approaches are being explored, including Google's method of using larger single logical qubits and others focusing on combining smaller numbers of qubits to create more logical qubits.
While this milestone represents progress toward error-resistant quantum computing, Hayes emphasized that additional advances are needed before achieving a fully fault-tolerant quantum computer suitable for industrial applications.
Note: None of the provided links were contextually relevant to the quantum computing article, so following instruction #4, I omitted them all.