Willow

 "Meet Willow, our state-of-the-art quantum chip"

Announcement and Achievements: Google Quantum AI unveiled Willow, a new 105-qubit superconducting quantum chip, achieving two breakthroughs: (1) exponential error reduction when scaling qubits (below the "threshold" for quantum error correction, a 30-year challenge), and (2) completing a random circuit sampling (RCS) benchmark in under 5 minutes—a task estimated to take 10^25 years (10 septillion years, exceeding the universe's age) on the world's fastest supercomputer, Frontier.

Quantum Error Correction Milestone: Willow demonstrates real-time error correction on a superconducting system, scaling from 3x3 to 7x7 qubit grids while halving error rates each time. This "beyond breakeven" result shows logical qubits outliving physical ones, proving scalability toward useful large-scale quantum computers. Published in Nature on Dec 9, 2024.

Benchmark Performance (RCS): RCS, a standard quantum supremacy test pioneered by Google, confirms Willow's "beyond-classical" capability. Results show double-exponential outpacing of classical systems, even under conservative assumptions favoring supercomputers.

Technical Specs and Fabrication: Built in a new Santa Barbara facility, Willow excels in holistic performance: average qubit connectivity of 3.47, T1 coherence times approaching 100 µs (5x improvement over prior chips), and top marks in gates, reset, and readout. Focus is on quality over mere qubit count.

Future Roadmap: Next steps include "useful, beyond-classical" computations for real-world applications (e.g., drug discovery, battery design, fusion energy). Willow bridges RCS (no practical apps yet) and scientific simulations (still classical-feasible). Google invites collaboration via open-source tools and a new Coursera course on error correction. Long-term vision: Quantum computing enhances AI for scalable algorithms in training, optimization, and quantum-effect modeling.