Microsoft says its researchers have created a new quantum computer processor that relies on a never-before-seen state of matter. The technological leap--called Majorana 1--represents a major step forward towards an era of powerful quantum computers that unlock currently unachievable advancements across artificial intelligence, medical research, sustainable energy, and many other industries. Since their invention, traditional computers have almost always relied on semiconductor chips that use binary "bits" of information represented as strings of 1's and 0's. While these chips have become increasingly powerful and simultaneously smaller, there is a physical limit to the amount of information that can be stored on this hardware. Quantum computers, by comparison, utilize "qubits" (quantum bits) to exploit the strange properties exhibited by subatomic particles, often at extremely cold temperatures.

Google's quantum computing breakthrough on Monday has left the physicist who heads the project a believer in'the idea that we live in a multiverse.' 'Willow,' the tech giant's new quantum chip, succeeded in solving a computational problem so complex it would have taken today's best super-computers an estimated 10 septillion years to solve it -- vastly more than the age of our entire universe. But Google said its new quantum computer solved the puzzle'in under five minutes.' Calling Willow's performance'astonishing,' the leader and founder of Google Quantum AI team, physicist Hartmut Neven, said its high-speed result'lends credence to the notion that quantum computation occurs in many parallel universes.' Neven credited Oxford University physicist David Deutsch for proposing the theory that the successful development of quantum computing would, in effect, affirm the'many worlds interpretation' of quantum mechanics and the existence of a multiverse. Starting in the 1970s, Deutsch, in fact, had walked backwards into becoming a pioneer in the field of quantum computing, less out of interest in the technology itself, than his desire to test the multiverse theory.

It measures just 4cm squared but it possesses almost inconceivable speed. That's 10 septillion years, a number that far exceeds the age of our known universe and has the scientists behind the latest quantum computing breakthrough reaching for a distinctly non-technical term: "mindboggling". The new chip, called Willow and made in the California beach town of Santa Barbara, is about the dimensions of an After Eight mint, and could supercharge the creation of new drugs by greatly speeding up the experimental phase of development. Reports of its performance follow a flurry of results since 2021 that suggest we are only about five years away from quantum computing becoming powerful enough to start transforming humankind's capabilities to research and develop new materials from drugs to batteries, one independent UK expert said. Governments around the world are pouring tens of billions of dollars into research.