For the first time, scientists at the University of Sydney have accurately predicted the future failure of quantum systems and used the information to prevent the breakdown of the quantum systems. Scientists worked with qubits, the fundamental building blocks for the most quantum-enabled technologies, to achieve this success.

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The research, published in Nature Communications, could help bring the strange and powerful world of quantum technology closer to reality.

The applications of quantum-enabled technologies have significant impacts, especially in the field of sensing and metrology. However, a significant obstacle in building reliable quantum technologies has been the "randomisation of quantum systems" by their decoherence, which destroys the useful quantum character.

Therefore, using techniques from big data to predict how quantum systems will change and prevent quantum system's breakdown from occurring is a technical quantum leap for physicists.

Professor Michael J. Biercuk, the senior author of the paper, said that quantum systems would fail just like the way individual components in mobile phones. However, in quantum technology, the lifetime is generally measured in fractions of a second instead of years.

Professor Biercuk, who is also a chief investigator at the Australian Research Council's Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems, said that his group had demonstrated the possibility to suppress decoherence in a preventive manner. The key lies in developing a technique to predict how the system would disintegrate, he added.

Making an analogy with the tennis sport, Professor Biercuk said that humans routinely employ predictive techniques in their daily experience. For instance, while playing tennis, one can predict where the ball will end up based on observations of the airborne ball. This works because the rules governing the movement of the ball, like gravity, are regular and known.

"But what if the rules changed randomly while the ball was on its way to you? Then it would be next to impossible to predict the future behavior of that ball," he said. 

The team used the techniques of machine learning to keep their quantum systems from breaking. According to the team, there was enough in the random behavior for the computer program to guess how the system would change in the future and then predict the future without direct observation.

"We're excited to be developing new capabilities that turn quantum systems from novelties into useful technologies. The quantum future is looking better all the time," Professor Biercuk said.