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takyon [soylentnews.org] writes:

IBM Raises the Bar with a 50-Qubit Quantum Computer [technologyreview.com]

IBM established a landmark in computing Friday, announcing a quantum computer that handles 50 quantum bits, or qubits. The company is also making a 20-qubit system available through its cloud computing platform.

IBM, Google, Intel, and a San Francisco startup called Rigetti [rigetti.com] are all currently racing to build useful quantum systems. These machines process information in a different way from traditional computers, using the counterintuitive nature of quantum physics.

The announcement does not mean quantum computing is ready for common use. The system IBM has developed is still extremely finicky and challenging to use, as are those being built by others. In both the 50- and the 20-qubit systems, the quantum state is preserved for 90 microseconds—a record for the industry, but still an extremely short period of time.

[...] IBM is also announcing an upgrade to its quantum cloud software [bluemix.net] system today. "We're at world record pace. But we've got to make sure non-physicists can use this," Gil says.

The announcement should perhaps be treated cautiously, though. Andrew Childs [umd.edu], a professor at the University of Maryland, points out that IBM has not published details of its system in a peer-reviewed journal. "IBM's team is fantastic and it's clear they're serious about this, but without looking at the details it's hard to comment," he says. Childs says the larger number of qubits does not necessarily translate to a leap in computational capability. "Those qubits might be noisy, and there could be issues with how well connected they are," he says.

Also at The Mercury News [mercurynews.com] and SiliconANGLE [siliconangle.com].

Previously: IBM Promises Commercialization of 50 Qubit Quantum Computers [soylentnews.org]
IBM and D-Wave Quantum Computing Announcements [soylentnews.org]
Intel Ships 17-Qubit Quantum Chip to Researchers [soylentnews.org]
Google's Quantum Computing Plans Threatened by IBM Curveball [soylentnews.org] (doesn't this undermine IBM's quantum system as well?)

Related: Microsoft is Developing a Quantum Computing Programming Language [soylentnews.org]

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