In his 2013 book, Schrödinger’s Killer App, Louisiana State University theoretical physicist Jonathan Dowling predicted what he called “super exponential growth.” He was right. Back in May, during Google’s Quantum Spring Symposium, computer engineer Hartmut Neven reported the company’s quantum computing chip had been gaining power at breakneck speed.
The subtext: We are venturing into an age of quantum supremacy — the point at which quantum computers outperform the best classical supercomputers in solving a well-defined problem.
Engineers test the accuracy of quantum computing chips by using them to solve a problem, and then verifying the work with a classical machine. But in early 2019, that process became problematic, reported Neven, who runs Google’s Quantum Artificial Intelligence Lab. Google’s quantum chip was improving so quickly that his group had to commandeer increasingly large computers — and then clusters of computers — to check its work. It’s become clear that eventually, they’ll run out of machines.
