Amazon Unveils Ocelot Quantum Chip

• Amazon Web Services (AWS) showcased Ocelot, its first quantum chip that targets the major reductions of quantum error correction costs by almost 90%, in another chunk of the history leading towards functional quantum computing.
• This step puts AWS in league with other technology giants like Microsoft and Google, both of which have lately come up with some quantum computing advancements.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has publicly unveiled its first chip crafted for quantum computing, named Ocelot, which goes beyond the initial level of a functioning quantum chip without error. One of the trickiest to solve is error correction. In the near term, Ocelot could achieve a reduction in the costs of error correction by as much as 90%, marking an extremely significant step towards creating actual error-corrected computation in quantum states.

Since their invention, quantum computers have generated awe by their ability to solve complex problems extraordinarily faster when compared to classical computers. Nevertheless, their extreme environmental sensitivity to vibrations, heat, electrostatic fields, and electromagnetic interference has permitted them to be nearly exterminated by errors, thus making their applications unreliable. Traditional error correction is very resource-intensive and requires an almost unmanageable number of qubits. Ocelot has addressed this problem by the inclusion of the “cat qubits” that come directly from the famous Schrödinger cat thought experiment. Unlike normal qubits, cat qubits suppress errors on some types of error suppression for bit-flip errors, reducing the need for large error correction concomitants.

Oscar Painter, AWS’s Director of Quantum Hardware, provided an illuminating perspective of the preparedness behind Ocelot’s inception: “We didn’t create an existing architecture and then go back and add error correction. We selected our qubit and architecture, and at the top of the list was the quantum error correction. This singular focus on error correction will impact the quantum computing timeline for practical applications by as much as five years.

Ocelot being announced shines a light on AWS being in company with the tech companies that are making their inroads in quantum computing. Microsoft has recently showcased its Majorana 1 chip, while Google has announced its advances in Willow to add stability and scalability to quantum systems. Quantum computers that could be used commercially are still several years away, experts believe.

But even as Ocelot is far from being a commercial product, the architecture is indicative of a way forward in the scalable and economical quantum-computing avenues. As Amazon improves the technology on this front, the applications would also be brought closer to reality across many fields, from cryptography to chemistry.