A quick look at everything that tickled my fancy this past week:
Quantum Supremacy?: Multinational conglomerate Honeywell claims that it has built the most powerful quantum computer ever, a feat that could put them on a path to eventually overtake Google for Quantum Supremacy!
According to New Scientist:
“Honeywell measured its computer’s capabilities using a metric invented by IBM called quantum volume. It takes into account the number of quantum bits – or qubits – the computer has, their error rate, how long the system can spend calculating before the qubits stop working and a few other key properties.
Measuring quantum volume involves running about 220 different algorithms on the computer, says Tony Uttley, the president of Honeywell Quantum Solutions. Honeywell’s quantum computer has a volume of 64, twice as high as the next highest quantum volume to be recorded, which was measured in an IBM quantum computer.
Like other quantum computers, this one may eventually be useful for calculations that deal with huge amounts of data. ‘There are three classes of problems that we are focused on right now: optimization, machine learning, and chemistry and material science,’ says Uttley. ‘We can do those problems shrunk down to a size that fits our quantum computer today and then, as we increase the quantum volume, we’ll be able to do those problems on bigger scales.’
However, this quantum computer isn’t yet able to perform calculations that would give a classical computer trouble, a feat called quantum supremacy, which was first claimed by Google in October.”
Fugaku: Speaking of computers we also heard this week that Japan’s Fugaku became the world’s fastest supercomputer!
As The Verge puts it:
“A Japanese supercomputer has taken the top spot in the biannual Top500 supercomputer speed ranking. Fugaku, a computer in Kobe co-developed by Riken and Fujitsu, makes use of Fujitsu’s 48-core A64FX system-on-chip. It’s the first time a computer based on ARM processors has topped the list.
Fugaku turned in a Top500 HPL result of 415.5 petaflops, 2.8 times as fast as IBM’s Summit, the nearest competitor. Fugaku also attained top spots in other rankings that test computers on different workloads, including Graph 500, HPL-AI, and HPCG. No previous supercomputer has ever led all four rankings at once.
While fastest supercomputer rankings normally bounce between American- and Chinese-made systems, this is Japan’s first system to rank first on the Top500 in nine years since Fugaku’s predecessor, Riken’s K computer. Overall there are 226 Chinese supercomputers on the list, 114 from America, and 30 from Japan. US-based systems contribute the most aggregate performance with 644 petaflops.”
And best of all it’s being put to immediate use to help research COVID-19.
“So far it has been used on an experimental basis to research COVID-19, including diagnostics, simulating the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, and the effectiveness of Japan’s new contact tracing app.”
Light Watching Microscope: Speaking of speed there is a new ultrafast microscope that is so powerful it can even watch light move!
As Futurism puts it:
“For the first time, scientists used a microscope to directly observe light as it traveled through a crystal.
The research, which was conducted with a one-of-a-kind, ultrafast transmission electron microscope at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, opens up a new realm of possibility to quantum scientists. Not only can researchers now observe phenomena they used to be forced to model or simulate, but the microscopy technique also makes it possible to study poorly-understood facets of the behavior of particles like photons and electrons.”
Light-Field Videos: Google also made headlines for a mind-blowing technological breakthrough thanks to their new light-field videos that use a combination of 46 cameras to create immersive scenes that you view continuously even while changing your perspective, effectively allowing you to peer around corners.
According to TechCrunch:
“The effect of high-definition video and freedom of movement gives these light field videos a real sense of reality. Existing VR-enhanced video generally uses fairly ordinary stereoscopic 3D, which doesn’t really allow for a change in viewpoint. And while Facebook’s method of understanding depth in photos and adding perspective to them is clever, it’s far more limited, creating only a small shift in perspective.
In Google’s videos, you can move your head a foot to the side to peek around a corner or see the other side of a given object — the image is photorealistic and full motion but in fact rendered in 3D, so even slight changes to the viewpoint are accurately reflected.
And because the rig is so wide, parts of the scene that are hidden from one perspective are visible from others. When you swing from the far right side to the far left and zoom in, you may find entirely new features — eerily reminiscent of the infamous ‘enhance’ scene from ‘Blade Runner.'”
Are any of these the Greatest Idea Ever?
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