topological quantum computing

3 Articles

Microsoft’s Topological Quantum Computing Claims Once Again In Question

June 30, 2026 by 15 Comments

A central problem with the arguably overhyped field of quantum computing remains the difficulty in objectively ascertaining performance and new developments, as much here relies on indirect measurements. Such is especially the case with topological quantum computing, with its use of Majorana fermions. For a few years now Microsoft’s quantum computing department (Azure Quantum) has made claims here of major progress, which have subsequently repeatedly been shot down in peer review. Their most recent attempt at said progress in topological quantum computing now got a blistering response (PDF) by Henry F. Legg in an article in Nature.

We previously reported on Microsoft’s attempts here in early 2025, when they claimed the detection of the crucial Majorana Zero Mode (MZM), before it faced the criticisms of peer review, including by Legg, which included academically vicious language by some researchers, including terms like ‘essentially fraudulent’.

This raises the awkward question of whether Microsoft’s quantum researchers are just too eager to confirm a discovery, or whether a more benign reason exists.

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Inca Knots Inspire Quantum Computer

July 28, 2022 by 19 Comments

We think of data storage as a modern problem, but even ancient civilizations kept records. While much of the world used stone tablets or other media that didn’t survive the centuries, the Incas used something called quipu which encoded numeric data in strings using knots. Now the ancient system of recording numbers has inspired a new way to encode qubits in a quantum computer.

With quipu, knots in a string represent a number. By analogy, a conventional qubit would be as if you used a string to form a 0 or 1 shape on a tabletop. A breeze or other “noise” would easily disturb your equation. But knots stay tied even if you pick the strings up and move them around. The new qubits are the same, encoding data in the topology of the material.

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Quantum computer

Scientific Honesty And Quantum Computing’s Latest Theoretical Hurdle

November 11, 2021 by 25 Comments

Quantum computers are really in their infancy. If you created a few logic gates with tubes back in the 1930s, it would be difficult to predict all the ways we would use computers today. However, you could probably guess where at least some of the problems would lie in the future. One of the things we are pretty sure will limit quantum computer development is error correction.

As far as we know, every quantum qubit we’ve come up with so far is very fragile and prone to random errors. That’s why every practical design today incorporates some sort of QEC — quantum error correction. Of course, error correction isn’t news. We use it all the time on unreliable storage media or communication channels and high-reliability memory. The problem is, you can’t directly clone a qubit (a quantum bit), so it is hard to use traditional error correction techniques with qubits.

After all, the whole point to a qubit is we don’t measure it until the end of the computation which, like Schrödinger’s cat, seals its fate. So if you were to “read” a bunch of qubits to form a checksum or a CRC, you’d destroy their quantum nature in the process making your computer not very useful. You can’t even copy a bit to use something like triple redundancy, either. There seems to be no way to practically duplicate a qubit.

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