Beyond NISQ: The Megaquop Machine

Abstract

Today's Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) computers have scientific value, but quantum machines with broad practical value must be protected against noise using quantum error correction and fault-tolerant protocols. Recent studies of quantum error correction on actual hardware are opening a new era of quantum information processing. Error-corrected computers capable of performing one million quantum operations or more may be realized soon, raising a compelling question for the quantum community: What are the potential uses of these megaquop machines?

(v2) Published version, references updated. (v1) 7 pages. Based on a keynote address at the Q2B 2024 Conference in Silicon Valley on 11 December 2024