IBM's Heron R3 quantum computer handled a task that made a classical method back down. The challenge was finding the ground state, the lowest energy level, of a system of 49 quantum bits.
An ice cube in tea melts without a trace. Similarly, quantum systems usually quickly forget their past. But under strong disorder, many-body localization emerges — particles seem to freeze, preserving memory.
The experiment on IBM's 144-qubit processor lasted 5000 cycles.