HRL Laboratories Runs Self-Contained Silicon Quantum Processor With Onboard Error Correction

HRL Laboratories published "A digitally controlled silicon quantum processing unit" as Nature's cover story, demonstrating an 18 exchange-only-qubit silicon spin chip (54 exchange-coupled quantum dots across three rails) paired with a custom 70-million-transistor CMOS controller operating at 4 Kelvin inside the same cryostat. The system generates all of its own time-varying control signals and runs repeated rounds of error correction with no real-time input from room-temperature electronics — the first time this has been shown for a silicon platform. Control errors fell roughly tenfold versus prior demonstrations, and errors dropped about fivefold as more qubits were added to the repetition code. The paper landed six days after IBM announced a definitive agreement to acquire HRL from joint owners Boeing and General Motors, bringing silicon spin qubits into IBM's Anderon quantum foundry roadmap.