With the IBM Eagle, the IT company of the same name has once again achieved a proverbial quantum leap. After all, it is the first quantum computer that can boast a number of over 100 quantum bits (qubits). If you are as unfamiliar with this quantity as I am, I have a small illustration ready. The IBM Eagle has so many qubits that it can produce more states than there are atoms in all of mankind. It really has nothing to do with the performance of a classical computer.
IBM’s latest generation
Of course, the epithet Eagle may sound a bit patriotic for a US company like IBM. However, leaving that lofty name aside, you can really only pay respect here when it comes to IBM’s latest generation of quantum computers. Now the company officially announces that they have left the trial status and could finally transfer the Eagle into an executable state. Especially the direct comparison to the predecessor makes it clear that IBM has not developed a simple successor here. One has to rightly speak of a new generation.
While the quantum computer called Hummingbird, which was active in 2020, achieved “just once” 65 qubits, the Eagle manages 127 qubits. That’s a glorious increase in performance not only for IBM itself, but for science as a whole. After all, no other quantum computer has even been able to reach a value of 100 qubits. The first work of the Eagle generation thus has such a high computing power that it cannot even be simulated by other computers. This not only applies to classic consumer PCs, but also to blazingly fast supercomputers.
At the end of imagination
With its computing power of 127 qubits, it is possible for the Eagle to achieve the unimaginable. As mentioned at the beginning, these are already enough to be able to create more states than there are atoms in all the human beings in the world put together. But this is only the beginning, if IBM has its way. The next generation of the company’s own quantum computer is to follow next year. The new generation, called Osprey, will more than double the computing power of its predecessor. Due to the complex interlocking of qubits, however, one cannot speak here of a mere doubling. Rather, the performance increases exponentially. What will this mean in the future? IBM is talking about the Osprey generation being able to map more states than there are atoms in our entire universe. It is possible that man is creating the first piece of technology here, in which the imagination of the possible is simply lost.
Classical processors as a model
A look at quantum computers in general and the premiere of the IBM Eagle in particular always leave us “normal” end users amazed. And rightly so. After all, we are talking about simply unimaginable computing power. But as futuristic as all this may sound, IBM’s source of inspiration seems to have been simple. The company says that they were inspired by the typical structure of common processors during the development. This looks as follows in detail.
The heart of every CPU is the so-called “logic”. This is made up of billions of transistors, which are connected to each other by various layers of high-quality metal. Everything sits together on a chip made of silicon. This looks very similar in the Eagle. However, instead of the transistors, Qbits sit on their own layer in this case. Independent of the “Qbits level”, the microwave switching works on a completely different level. Until now, IBM relied on only one plane.
If you take a look at the arrangement of the Qbits, a comparison to the animal world quickly suggests itself. After all, IBM positions them in the form of a honeycomb pattern. The pattern, which is called “heavy hex topology”, is not only supposed to look cool, but also has a significant practical benefit. IBM talks about the fact that there is a significantly lower risk of errors in contrast to the previous arrangement in triangles or squares. In the end, this should once again provide for more performance.
However, IBM has not tried to reinvent the wheel at every point in the Eagle. For example, the control still runs roughly the same way as in the Hummbingbird. However, due to the excessive increase in the number of qubits, IBM relies on bundled readout multiplexing in the Eagle. The goal of this measure was to reduce the amount of necessary cabling and other electronics to a minimum. IBM will be glad to have found this solution for the successor at the latest.
