IBM Leads the Way in Quantum Computing Advancements

IBM researchers have developed a method to manage the unreliability of quantum computers, which could lead to reliable, useful answers. They used a quantum processor with 127 qubits to simulate the behavior of 127 atom-scale bar magnets in a magnetic field, a simple system known as the Ising model. The calculation took less than a thousandth of a second to complete, and the researchers were able to subtract the effects of noise from the unreliable quantum calculations, a process they call error mitigation. This could be used for increasingly complex problems beyond the Ising model, such as figuring out the properties of exotic materials, accelerating drug discovery, and modeling fusion reactions.