Domestic quantum chips are new
Author/ IT Times reporter Hao Junhui
Editor/ Sun Yan
There is good news again from the domestic quantum information industry.
On April 25, Guodun Quantum announced that the Institute of Quantum Information and Quantum Technology Innovation of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (hereinafter referred to as the Institute of Quantum Innovation) delivered a 504-bit superconducting quantum computing chip "Xiaohong" to Guodun Quantum, which not only refreshed the record of the number of superconducting qubits in China, but also planned to open its computing power to the world through the "Tianyan" quantum computing cloud platform of China Telecom Quantum Group in the future.
What's more exciting is that Peng Chengzhi, professor of the Quantum Innovation Institute and chief scientist of China Telecom Quantum Group and Guodun Quantum, revealed that the superconducting quantum computing team of the Quantum Innovation Institute is developing a superconducting quantum computing chip with 1000+ bits and high quality to achieve fault-tolerant quantum computing.
In August, the test of the TT&C system will be completed
"The main goal of this customized chip is to verify the thousand-bit measurement and control system independently developed by Guodun Quantum," Liang Futian, an associate researcher at the Institute of Quantum Innovation, said in an interview with the media, including the "IT Times", although there is still a gap between "Xiaohong" and the "Zu Chongzhi No. 2" chip that the team previously created a world record for quantum entanglement, and does not have the ability of "quantum computing superiority", its core role is to promote the development of large-scale quantum computing measurement and control systems.
The core hardware of a superconducting quantum computer is the measurement and control system and the quantum computing chip processor, which can be roughly compared to the motherboard and CPU in a classical computer. The calculation of each bit requires precise control by one or several measurement and control systems to achieve accurate signal generation, transmission and processing.
Despite the speed and parallelism of quantum computers, qubits are so fragile that even the slightest interaction with their surroundings can cause them to change, in what is physically known as the "decoherence" effect. In order to isolate these environmental influences and maintain the superconducting effect, superconducting quanta need to be close to absolute zero. However, the measurement and control system is an ordinary room temperature device, which means that in order to accurately measure and control a qubit, the measurement and control system must suppress the noise in the macroscopic world, find and amplify the real bit information and measurement and control signal, "This is equivalent to a football field, you can see the vibration of a grain of sand." Chu Wenhao, head of the Guodun quantum cloud platform, told the IT Times.
According to Wang Zhehui, the person in charge of Guodun quantum computing, the "Xiaohong" chip will be tested on the national shield quantum kilobit measurement and control system for single-bit gates, two-bit gates, reading operations and measurement and control system performance, and the test work is expected to be completed before August this year.
It is understood that compared with the first-generation measurement and control system, the integration of the second-generation measurement and control system has been increased by more than 10 times, and each chassis supports up to 128 XY channels, 320 Z channels and 8 read amplification PUMP channels, which can support kilobit superconducting quantum computing at the scale of 10 chassis. The core components are designed with localization, which greatly reduces the cost while improving the control accuracy.
In the future, Guodun Quantum will further develop a new measurement and control system suitable for error-correctable quantum computers on a 10,000-bit scale.
The difficulty of "Xiaohong" is not difficult
"It is not difficult to develop this chip", Peng Chengzhi said frankly, superconducting quantum computing chips can reuse more mature semiconductor chip processing technology, and have special advantages in the expansion of the number of bits, "The most difficult thing is how to improve the quality and quantity of qubits simultaneously, so as to truly improve the performance of the chip and control large-scale qubits more precisely, which is what the international mainstream scientific research team is tackling." ”
In the interview, Guodun Quantum repeatedly emphasized that the computing power of superconducting quantum cannot be judged simply by the number of bits. In the past six months, there have been continuous breakthroughs in global quantum information technology. At the end of the year and the beginning of the year, IBM launched a 1386+ quantum chip called Flamingo, which is the first QPU to use remote coupling, and it is also the same time that IBM demonstrates a parallel quantum processor that uses three links to connect. But IBM has not announced that it has achieved "quantum superiority."
The computing power that can be achieved by superconducting quantum computers depends on several factors, such as the number of bits, fidelity, coherence time, gate operation speed, connectivity, etc. "Quantum computing is a long journey, and we have to go over many peaks before we can really move towards practical use, and what we need to take next is a more critical step. Peng Chengzhi said.
Although there is still a gap between the comprehensive performance and the hexagonal warrior "Zu Chongzhi No. 2" chip that achieves "quantum superiority", the key indicators such as qubit lifetime, gate fidelity, gate depth, and reading fidelity of "Xiaohong" are expected to reach the chip performance of IBM and other international mainstream quantum computing cloud platforms.
In the future, quantum cloud services will be provided to the world
"IT Times" learned on the spot that after the completion of the quantum computing kilobit measurement and control system and the "Xiaohong" test, it will rely on the "Xiaohong" chip to develop a quantum computing machine in the future, and open it to the world after accessing the "Tianyan" quantum computing cloud platform.
"Tianyan" is a quantum cloud platform launched by China Telecom Quantum Group, based on the advantages of China Telecom e Cloud's "National Cloud", which realizes the integration of "e Cloud" supercomputing capability and 176-qubit superconducting quantum computing capabilities, and can realize the hybrid scheduling of supercomputing and quantum computing tasks on the cloud based on the super hybrid cloud architecture.
"Tianyan" not only refreshed the record of the number of bits of superconducting quantum computers on the mainland cloud platform, but also the first quantum computing cloud platform in the world that has the potential to achieve quantum superiority on the superconducting quantum route and is open to the outside world.
"The cloud access of 500+ bit quantum computers can efficiently carry the research of users in various fields on problems and algorithms with practical value, accelerate the application of quantum computing in practical scenarios, and lead the rapid development of the quantum computing ecosystem. Wang Zhen, Ph.D. from the University of Science and Technology of China and deputy general manager of China Telecom Quantum Group, said.
Typesetting / Ji Jiaying
Image / National Shield Quantum
Source/"IT Times" official account vittimes