It's really not so extraordinary, exponential reduction in logical errors when the physical error rate is below a threshold (for certain types of error correcting codes_ is well accepted an both theoretical and computational grounds.

For a rough but well-sourced overview, see Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Threshold_theorem

For a review paper on surface codes, see A. G. Fowler, M. Mariantoni, J. M. Martinis, and A. N. Cleland, “Surface codes: Towards practical large-scale quantum computation,” Phys. Rev. A, vol. 86, no. 3, p. 032324, Sep. 2012, doi: 10.1103/PhysRevA.86.032324.

>That's an EXTRAORDINARY claim and one that contradicts the experience of pretty much all other research and development in quantum error correction over the course of the history of quantum computing.

Not sure why you would say that? This sort of exponential suppression of errors is exactly how quantum error correction works and why we think quantum computing is viable. Source: have worked on quantum error correction for a couple of decades. Disclosure: I work on the team that did this experiment. More reading: lecture notes from back in the day explaining this exponential suppression https://courses.cs.washington.edu/courses/cse599d/06wi/lectu...

I wouldn't call it extraordinary, as this has been expected since the first quantum error correcting codes were worked out theoretically. But it is a strong claim, backed up with comparably strong evidence. Figure 1d of the paper shows exactly this https://arxiv.org/html/2408.13687v1, and unlike many other comparable works, there are no hat tricks like post-selection to boost the numbers.

It's a categorically new experimental regime but it's exactly what was supposed to happen. I think it's an awesome result.

it... doesn't? threshold theorems are well known.