A team of Google and NASA engineers has finally revealed the most significant breakthrough in terms of quantum mechanics that can lead to rapid advancements in material science for supercomputers.

This supercomputer is hidden within NASA's Advanced Supercomputing Division in SIlicon Valley which is known as the D-Wave 2X Quantum Computer. This massive black box is obtained by NASA and Google back in 2013 to solve complex problems that traditional computers cannot decipher.

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According to John Giannandrea who is the Google Vice President for Engineering, the team already encountered problems that would be solved easier with this compared to conventional computers as the team is in the quest to understand more about what lies for us beyond conventional computing.

Now, NASA revealed that the D-Wave 2X resulted in an answer for an optimization problem in just a matter of seconds where its processing speed is 100 million times the speed of average computer chips. According to Google Director of Engineering, Hartmut Neven, the D-Wave 2X can apparently process something within a second that would take a single core classic computer a span of 10,000 years.

These quantum computers like the D-Wave 2X are extremely faster than any computer since they run on quantum bits or qubits as opposed to 0s and 1s. When it comes to computing qubits, each 0 and 1 can be executed simultaneously resulting in completing calculations at higher speeds. 

To date, the D-Wave 2X is running on 1,097 qubits which is suited best for optimization issues, according to engineers. Optimization problems entail instances when scientists have to filter the best solution from any number of possible solutions. 

These problems are often encountered during air traffic control systems including space missions where NASA devotes most of its computing powers to.

This latest problem solved by the D-Wave 2X included 1,000 variables and scientists believe that systems with quantum effects can help solve more complex problems.

This can be considered as a breakthrough in quantum mechanics however Google and NASA engineers still warn about using these quantum computers. Currently, the D-Wave 2X computer can only perform a limited amount of quantum calculations, according to the team. Apparently only a few people know how to manipulate optimization problems for quantum computers as they are not an easy task.

Neven says that the team is still working on making it easier to solve practical optimization problems, making it easier to input into the machine, which is not quite there yet.

Tagsquantum mechanics, quantum computers, google NASA quantum computer, D-Wave 2X quantum computer, quantum computers optimization problems, Supercomputers, D-Wave 2X