Quantum computational advantage using photons
Han-Sen Zhong, Hui Wang, Yu-Hao Deng, Ming-Cheng Chen, Li-Chao Peng, Yi-Han Luo, Jian Qin, Dian Wu, Xing Ding, Yi Hu, Peng Hu, Xiao-Yan Yang, Wei-Jun Zhang, Hao Li, Yuxuan Li, Xiao Jiang, Lin Gan, Guangwen Yang, Lixing You, Zhen Wang, Li Li, Nai-Le Liu, Chao-Yang Lu, Jian-Wei Pan
Abstract
A light approach to quantum advantage Quantum computational advantage or supremacy is a long-anticipated milestone toward practical quantum computers. Recent work claimed to have reached this point, but subsequent work managed to speed up the classical simulation and pointed toward a sample size–dependent loophole. Quantum computational advantage, rather than being a one-shot experimental proof, will be the result of a long-term competition between quantum devices and classical simulation. Zhong et al. sent 50 indistinguishable single-mode squeezed states into a 100-mode ultralow-loss interferometer and sampled the output using 100 high-efficiency single-photon detectors. By obtaining up to 76-photon coincidence, yielding a state space dimension of about 10 30 , they measured a sampling rate that is about 10 14 -fold faster than using state-of-the-art classical simulation strategies and supercomputers. Science , this issue p. 1460