MOSCOW, Janaury 28. /TASS/. The quantum computer currently in development by Russian scientists will achieve the so-called "quantum supremacy," or the ability to perform operations, practically impossible for the existing conventional supercomputers, in two years, says Sergei Kulik, the head of Quantum Technologies Center of the Moscow State University Faculty of Physics.
"There is a Perspective Research Fund project called ‘Priboy.’ According to the project’s goals, we must create a quantum simulator and achieve quantum supremacy in two years — i.e. show a calculation that is impossible for a classical computer," Kulik said.
Currently, the laboratory has two physical platforms for building a quantum computer — the one based on neutral atoms and the other based on photon chips.
"Today, we work with tens of rubidium atoms. We can regularly arrange them in space at a distance of several micrometers, access them with laser fields independently, excite them and read information from them," Kulik explained.
He pointed out that there are about ten quantum computer platforms in development, four of them in Russia — including the MISiS University superconductor platform. Currently, the scientists cannot predict, which platform will lead to a technological breakthrough.
Google was the first to claim achieving quantum supremacy in October 2019. In an article for Nature, the science team led by John Martinis of the University of California said its 53 qubit Sycamore processor managed to crack a task, which would take IBM’s most powerful Summit classic supercomputer 10,000 years, in 3 minutes and 20 seconds. Considering such long time span, Google claimed that while Summit theoretically can perform the same calculation, the time span is too long to be considered feasible. Therefore, Google asserted, Sycamore can perform calculations impossible for conventional machines.
However, the Google’s claim was preemptively rebuked by IBM, who said in their post that it is just a matter of programming, and that a carefully rewritten program can perform the same calculation in just 2.5 days, which is, while arguably long, totally feasible from a practical standpoint.