Quantum AI Chip "Willow" by Google Quantum AI.
An international team of scientists has observed a never-before-seen exotic phase of matter on a quantum processor using Google’s 58-qubit AI chip Willow, which previously suggested we may live in a multiverse.
The research team from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) in Germany, New Jersey’s Princeton University and Google Quantum AI, realized a Floquet topologically ordered state for the very first time.
The state is a non-equilibrium quantum state of matter in a system driven by a time-periodic Hamiltonian, which is a physical system whose governing rules change over time, but with a repeating, predictable cycle.
This exotic phase had been theoretically proposed for years, but until now it had never been directly observed in any experiment. According to TUM, this marks a great step ahead in the study of quantum matter.
Phases of matter are the basic states that matter can take, similarly to how water can occur in a liquid or ice phase. They are defined under equilibrium conditions where the system is stable over time.
However, nature doesn’t always follow conventional rules. Some phases of matter emerge only when systems are pushed out of equilibrium. The team has now proved that quantum computers are uniquely suited to uncover and study these unusual states.
In contrast to conventional phases of matter, the non-equilibrium quantum ones are defined by their dynamical and time-evolving properties. For the time being, traditional equilibrium thermodynamics fail to capture this behavior.
A notably rich type of non-equilibrium state is found in Floquet systems. These are quantum systems driven in a regular time pattern. This rhythmic driving can create new forms of order that are impossible to achieve in equilibrium, revealing phenomena beyond the reach of conventional phases of matter.
But now, using Willow, Google’s 58-qubit quantum processor, the team imaged the new phase’s behavior and developed an interferometric algorithm to probe its topological structure.
This allowed the scientists to witness the dynamical ‘transmutation’ of exotic particles, which had been theoretically predicted for these exotic quantum states.
Qubits as lab space
Willow previously made headlines for its mind-bending computational power. It also sparked a debate over whether its performance indirectly supported the multiverse theory.
The concept, first proposed by US physicist Hugh Everett in 1957, suggests that the universe is just one of many universes that together form a larger one, which contains everything that exists, including space, time, matter, energy, and data.
By performing a computation in under five minutes that would likely take one of today’s fastest supercomputers 10 septillion years to complete, just last year, the powerful AI chip hinted at the possibility of parallel universes being real.
The team believes the findings represent the beginning of a new chapter in quantum simulation by transforming quantum computers into labs to explore the vast, uncharted world of out-of-equilibrium quantum matter. The insights could help better understand physics and develop future quantum technologies.
“Highly entangled non-equilibrium phases are notoriously hard to simulate with classical computers,” Melissa Will, PhD student at the physics department of the TUM school of natural sciences and first author of the study, explained.
“Our results show that quantum processors are not just computational devices – they are powerful experimental platforms for discovering and probing entirely new states of matter,” Will concluded in a press release.
The study has been published in the journal Nature.
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