Google has unveiled Quantum Echoes, a quantum algorithm that the company says represents a "major step" toward quantum computing and its practical, real-world applications.
"In December 2024, we announced a major technological breakthrough with Willow -- a next-generation quantum chip -- and today we're announcing a breakthrough in its software, with the first quantum algorithm," the Google Quantum AI team summarizes.
Some of the details of Quantum Echoes are published in the journal Nature, in an article signed by, among others, the Frenchman Michel Devoret, Nobel Prize in Physics 2025, affiliated with Google Research and the University of California.
The other - more focused on applications and still as proof of principle - appears in a paper in the arXiv repository, without review by other researchers.
"We are optimistic that within five years we will see real-world applications that are only possible on quantum computers," said Hartmut Neven, founder and director of Google Quantum AI, at a press conference.
Sources consulted by EFE indicate that while this research represents a further step in the field of quantum computing, it is, like others, still preliminary and far from the definitive development of a quantum computer and its practical utility.
Why does Google say it's a big step?
The mission of quantum computers -- still prototypes -- like conventional and supercomputers, is to perform operations, which the former execute very differently: they work at the atomic level and, therefore, follow the rules of quantum physics (responsible for studying the world at very small spatial scales).
Quantum computers work with qubits (the basic unit of quantum information) rather than bits (like traditional ones); the former will be able to solve problems that classical supercomputers cannot.
According to the company, its algorithm is a breakthrough because it features quantum advantage -- it runs 13.000 times faster on Willow than the best classical algorithm on the world's fastest supercomputers -- it is verifiable; and it has potential for real-world applications.
Quantum verifiability means, according to Google, that the result can be compared and verified by another quantum computer of similar quality. To offer both accuracy and complexity, the hardware must have two key characteristics: extremely low error rates and high-speed operations.
One of the problems with quantum systems is that they are very sensitive to noise -- changes in temperature, light -- and this can disrupt the calculation, which is exacerbated the larger the installation.
The solution to the problem, therefore, lies in correcting quantum errors, and that is one of the great challenges (classical computers are already built with these mechanisms, and last year Google took steps in this direction with Willow).
In terms of utility, the algorithm takes a "significant step" toward its first real-world application: calculating the structure of a molecule.
One of the tools scientists use to understand chemical structure is nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR), the same science that underlies MRI technology.
This acts as a molecular microscope, powerful enough
as to allow the relative position of the atoms to be seen, which helps to understand the structure of a molecule.
In a proof-of-principle experiment with the University of California, Berkeley, the team ran Quantum Echoes on the Willow chip to study two molecules, one with 15 atoms and one with 28, to verify this approach.
The results were consistent with those of traditional MRI, but also revealed information not typically available with MRI, "which provides crucial validation of the approach."
This experiment is a step toward a "quantum microscope" capable of measuring natural phenomena that were previously unobservable.
Quantum computing-enhanced NMR could become a powerful tool for drug discovery or in materials science to characterize the molecular structure of polymers or battery components, Google describes.