🌟 Big milestone from Russia! On Monday, December 29, 2025, the Russian Quantum Center (RQC) announced its first ion-based quantum computer, boasting the firepower of a 72-qubit system. That's a giant leap from the usual 2-level qubits — they’re using 7 levels per ion! 🚀
Instead of classic qubits that flip between on/off, each of the 26 calcium ions in this machine can hop across seven energy states (0 to 6), packing way more info into fewer particles. Think of it like upgrading from a basic flip phone to a feature-packed smartphone… in quantum land! 📱⚛️
Head of RQC, Maxim Ostras, says the team started testing this multi-level magic back in 2021. In just four years, they pushed their setup from a tiny testbed to a full-fledged prototype that matches 72 qubits — all while hitting record accuracy levels.
Tests showed single-qubit ops at 99.92% accuracy and two-qubit ops at 96.5% — top scores for systems this size. To pull this off, scientist Kirill Lakhmanskiy and the team crafted custom lasers and an intricate optical system for pinpoint control.
What's next? They’re gearing up to run combinatorial optimization algorithms, the same brainteasers behind network design and logistics planning. If all goes well, this ion-based approach could shake up industries from finance to supply chains. 💡🔗
Stay tuned: Russia's quantum journey is just getting started, and this 7-level breakthrough might be the spark that lights the next era of computing. 💥
Reference(s):
Russia builds ion-based quantum computer equivalent to 72 qubits
cgtn.com
