Mullaghmore and Tievebaun form backdrop for Google launch of state-of-the-art Willow quantum chip

Hartmut Neven, founder and lead of Google Quantum AI, announced Google scientists had published a paper in the journal Nature that showed the new chip had achieved remarkable results across a number of indicators.

“Willow performed a standard benchmark computation in under five minutes that would take one of today’s fastest supercomputers 10 septillion (that is, 1025) years — a number that vastly exceeds the age of the Universe,” he stated, in a blog post.

He declared: “The Willow chip is a major step on a journey that began over 10 years ago. When I founded Google Quantum AI in 2012, the vision was to build a useful, large-scale quantum computer that could harness quantum mechanics — the ‘operating system’ of nature to the extent we know it today — to benefit society by advancing scientific discovery, developing helpful applications, and tackling some of society's greatest challenges.

"As part of Google Research, our team has charted a long-term roadmap, and Willow moves us significantly along that path towards commercially relevant applications.”

Intriguingly Google selected a much-loved beach and beauty spot in the North West in the graphics for its eye-catching announcement.

The blog post revealing the quantum leap featured a view of Mullaghmore and Tievebaun and its sister peaks in the Darty mountains with an image of the Willow chip and logo emblazoned on top. The Darty range runs across Sligo and Leitrim close to Bundoran in south Donegal.

The awesome backdrop served to illustrate the awesome claims of Neven and his colleauges.

The German computer scientist said: “Quantum computation will be indispensable for collecting training data that’s inaccessible to classical machines, training and optimizing certain learning architectures, and modelling systems where quantum effects are important.

"This includes helping us discover new medicines, designing more efficient batteries for electric cars, and accelerating progress in fusion and new energy alternatives.

"Many of these future game-changing applications won’t be feasible on classical computers; they’re waiting to be unlocked with quantum computing.”

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