Microsoft has unveiled a new chip it says could deliver quantum computers with real-world applications in ‘years, not decades’.
Majorana 1 is the world’s first Quantum Processing Unit (QPU) to be powered by a Topological Core, designed to scale to a million qubits on a single chip.
The announcement is based on the development of the world’s first topoconductor – a new class of materials that enables topological superconductivity, a new state of matter that previously existed only in theory.
To do this, the company has designed and built gate-defined devices that combine indium arsenide – a semiconductor – and superconductor aluminum.
When cooled to near absolute zero and tuned with magnetic fields, these devices form topological superconducting nanowires, with Majorana Zero Modes (MZMs) at the wires’ ends.
“After a nearly 20 year pursuit, we’ve created an entirely new state of matter, unlocked by a new class of materials, topoconductors, that enable a fundamental leap in computing. It powers Majorana 1, the first quantum processing unit built on a topological core,” said Microsoft chairman and CEO Satya Nadella.
“The qubits created with topoconductors are faster, more reliable, and smaller. They are 1/100th of a millimeter, meaning we now have a clear path to a million-qubit processor.”
With the core building blocks now demonstrated — quantum information encoded in MZMs, protected by topology, and processed through measurements — Microsoft said it’s ready to move from physics breakthrough to practical implementation.
The next step will be a scalable architecture built around a single-qubit device called a tetron, building up to larger arrays of tetrons delivering multiple error-corrected qubits.
The company said it’s also on track to build a fault-tolerant prototype of a scalable quantum computer over the next few years as part of the final phase of DARPA’s Underexplored Systems for Utility-Scale Quantum Computing (US2QC) program.
“Together, these milestones mark a pivotal moment in quantum computing as we advance from scientific exploration to technological innovation,” said Chetan Nayak, technical fellow and corporate vice president of quantum hardware.
Microsoft’s quantum timeline is a game changer
Microsoft is avoiding any specific timeline beyond its ‘years, not decades’ claim, and there will no doubt be setbacks along the way. But after years of hype, the prospect of quantum computers with tangible real-world applications is beginning to come to fruition.
Late last year, for example, Google unveiled a new chip, dubbed ‘Willow’, which it said could solve equations that would typically take ten septillion years in a matter of minutes.
The firm suggested that commercial applications could appear by the end of this decade.
However, some leading industry figures are more skeptical. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, for example, recently suggested it would probably take 20 years before useful quantum computers emerged.
Huang’s comments sparked a tumble in shares at a number of leading quantum computing companies.
