.jpg)
7 hours ago
4
Article content
Have we really achieved quantum supremacy?
Article content
Quantum scientists and researchers largely agree that Amazon and Google’s chips signified major breakthroughs in the progress of error-corrected quantum computers.
Article content
“(The) clever physics, computer science, and sophisticated engineering they harnessed to approach the holy grail of ‘fault tolerance’ is extremely exciting,” said Aephraim Steinberg, a University of Toronto physics professor and founding member of the Centre for Quantum Information and Quantum Control.
Article content
Still, the claims of quantum supremacy have been hotly debated within the academic community.
Article content
Google was the first to make the claim in 2019, followed by China’s University of Science and Technology in 2020 and Toronto quantum computing firm Xanadu Technologies Inc. in 2022.
Article content
“It would be an understatement to say that the jury is still out about Microsoft and D-Wave’s claims,” Steinberg said. Some physicists contend that traditional computers can accomplish what D-Wave’s machine achieved, while scientists have pushed back on Microsoft’s claims citing a lack of evidence. “That’s not to say that (their) approaches aren’t promising … but simply that there hasn’t been persuasive evidence presented publicly that either of these goals has yet been achieved,” he said.
Article content
Article content
Article content
How soon will quantum computing be commercialized?
Article content
Quantum computing remains at a nascent stage.
Article content
The recent claims of quantum advantage are “interesting” but involve “commercially irrelevant computational problems,” according to Barry Sanders, a physics professor at the University of Calgary and scientific director at Quantum City, an ecosystem for quantum science and technology in Alberta. This means that real-world use cases of the technology are still years away.
Article content
Experts have offered varying timelines on how quickly mainstream adoption and commercialization will materialize. Many say that quantum computing for practical, niche applications is at least half-a-decade away. It would be a stretch to see widespread adoption in that time frame, Steinberg said, “though 10 years would no longer strike me as madness.”
Article content
Juan Carrasquilla, an associate professor of physics at ETH Zurich and a faculty affiliate at The Vector Institute, a Toronto-based AI research organization, said today’s quantum computers aren’t yet powerful enough to take on the kinds of cybersecurity tasks that many see as promising uses of the technology.
Article content
Article content
“Running these algorithms on a large-scale, relevant for real-world cryptographic protocols, has not been demonstrated yet,” he said, adding that at present, quantum computers are not suited to most tasks and aren’t expected to replace supercomputers, which are better for AI, anytime soon.
Article content
What role has Canada played in the development of quantum computing technology?
Article content
Canada has long been a hotbed of quantum computing, with a mix of public and private funds helping catalyze the sector in the early 2000s.
Article content
D-Wave released the first computer based on quantum technology in 2011. By mid-decade, Vancouver-based 1Qbit had become the first software firm dedicated to making commercial applications for quantum computers. A few years later, Xanadu, which recently announced plans to go public via a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC, launched the first dedicated machine learning software for quantum computers.
Article content
Today, Canada is home to more than 60 quantum startups and SMEs — spanning technologies from quantum computing to sensors and communications — meaning it has the world’s highest concentration of quantum companies per capita.
English (US)