Quantum Computing

What is quantum computing?

Quantum computing is an emergent field of cutting-edge computer
science harnessing the unique qualities of quantum mechanics to
solve problems beyond the ability of even the most powerful
classical computers.

The field of quantum computing contains a range of disciplines, including quantum hardware
and quantum algorithms. While still in development, quantum technology will soon be able to
solve complex problems that supercomputers can’t solve, or can’t solve fast enough.

By taking advantage of quantum physics, fully realized quantum computers would be able to
process massively complicated problems at orders of magnitude faster than modern machines.
For a quantum computer, challenges that might take a classical computer thousands of years to
complete might be reduced to a matter of minutes.

The study of subatomic particles, also known as quantum mechanics, reveals unique and
fundamental natural principles. Quantum computers harness these fundamental phenomena to
compute probabilistically and quantum mechanically.
Four key principles of quantum mechanics
Understanding quantum computing requires understanding these four key principles of quantum
mechanics:

Superposition: Superposition is the state in which a quantum particle or system can represent
not just one possibility, but a combination of multiple possibilities.
Entanglement: Entanglement is the process in which multiple quantum particles become
correlated more strongly than regular probability allows.
Decoherence: Decoherence is the process in which quantum particles and systems can decay,
collapse or change, converting into single states measurable by classical physics.
Interference: Interference is the phenomenon in which entangled quantum states can interact
and produce more and less likely probabilities.
Qubits
While classical computers rely on binary bits (zeros and ones) to store and process data, quantum
computers can encode even more data at once using quantum bits, or qubits, in superposition.

A qubit can behave like a bit and store either a zero or a one, but it can also be a weighted
combination of zero and one at the same time. When combined, qubits in superposition can scale
exponentially. Two qubits can compute with four pieces of information, three can compute with
eight, and four can compute with sixteen.

However, each qubit can only output a single bit of information at the end of the computation.
Quantum algorithms work by storing and manipulating information in a way inaccessible to
classical computers, which can provide speedups for certain problems.

As silicon chip and superconductor development has scaled over the years, it is distinctly
possible that we might soon reach a material limit on the computing power of classical
computers. Quantum computing could provide a path forward for certain important problems.

With leading institutions such as IBM, Microsoft, Google and Amazon joining eager startups
such as Rigetti and Ionq in investing heavily in this exciting new technology, quantum
computing is estimated to become a USD 1.3 trillion industry by 2035. 1

What is the quantum computing advantage?

Currently, no quantum computer can perform a useful task faster, cheaper, or more efficiently
than a classical computer. Quantum advantage is the threshold where we have built a quantum
system that can perform operations that the best possible classical computer cannot simulate in
any kind of reasonable time.

What is quantum mechanics?

Quantum mechanics is the area of physics that studies the behavior of particles at a microscopic
level. At subatomic levels, the equations that describe how particles behave is different from
those that describe the macroscopic world around us. Quantum computers take advantage of
these behaviors to perform computations in a completely new way.

What are the components of a quantum computer ?

Quantum computers have hardware and software, similar to a classical computer.
Quantum hardware

Quantum hardware has three main components.

Quantum data plane
The quantum data plane is the core of the quantum computer and includes the physical qubits
and the structures required to hold them in place.
Control and measurement plane
The control and measurement plane converts digital signals into analog or wave control signals.
These analog signals perform the operations on the qubits in the quantum data plane.
Control processor plane and host processor
The control processor plane implements the quantum algorithm or sequence of operations. The
host processor interacts with the quantum software and provides a digital signal or classical bits
sequence to the control and measurement plane.

Quantum software

Quantum software implements unique quantum algorithms using quantum circuits. A quantum
circuit is a computing routine that defines a series of logical quantum operations on the
underlying qubits. Developers can use various software development tools and libraries to code
quantum algorithms.

What are the types of quantum technology?

No one has shown the best way to build a fault-tolerant quantum computer, and multiple
companies and research groups are investigating different types of qubits. We give a brief
example of some of these qubit technologies below.
Gate-based ion trap processors
A gate-based quantum computer is a device that takes input data and transforms it according to a
predefined unitary operation. The operation is typically represented by a quantum circuit and is
analogous to gate operations in traditional electronics. However, quantum gates are totally
different from electronic gates.
Trapped ion quantum computers implement qubits using electronic states of charged atoms
called ions. The ions are confined and suspended above the microfabricated trap using
electromagnetic fields. Trapped-ion based systems apply quantum gates using lasers to
manipulate the electronic state of the ion. Trapped ion qubits use atoms that come from nature,
rather than manufacturing the qubits synthetically.
Gate-based superconducting processors
Superconductivity is a set of physical properties that you can observe in certain materials like
mercury and helium at very low temperatures. In these materials, you can observe a
characteristic critical temperature below which electrical resistance is zero and magnetic flux
fields are expelled. An electric current through a loop of superconducting wire can persist
indefinitely with no power source.
Superconducting quantum computing is an implementation of a quantum computer in
superconducting electronic circuits. Superconducting qubits are built with superconducting
electric circuits that operate at cryogenic temperatures.
Photonic processors
A quantum photonic processor is a device that manipulates light for computations. Photonic
quantum computers use quantum light sources that emit squeezed-light pulses, with qubit
equivalents that correspond to modes of a continuous operator, such as position or momentum.
Neutral atom processors
Neutral atom qubit technology is similar to trapped ion technology. However, it uses light
instead of electromagnetic forces to trap the qubit and hold it in position. The atoms are not
charged and the circuits can operate at room temperatures
Rydberg atom processors
A Rydberg atom is an excited atom with one or more electrons that are further away from the
nucleus, on average. Rydberg atoms have a number of peculiar properties including an
exaggerated response to electric and magnetic fields, and long life. When used as qubits, they
offer strong and controllable atomic interactions that you can tune by selecting different states.
Quantum annealers
Quantum annealing uses a physical process to place a quantum system's qubits in an absolute
energy minimum. From there, the hardware gently alters the system's configuration so that its
energy landscape reflects the problem that needs to be solved. The advantage of quantum
annealers is that the number of qubits can be much larger than those available in a gate-based
system. However, their use is limited to specific cases only.

How do companies use quantum computing?

Quantum computing can revolutionize industries. We give some examples use cases below:
ML
Machine learning (ML) is the process of analyzing vast quantities of data to help computers
make better predictions and decisions. Research in quantum computing studies the physical
limits of information processing and is breaking new ground in fundamental physics. This
research leads to advances in many fields of science and industry, such as chemistry,
optimization, and molecular simulation. It is also a growing area of interest for financial services
to predict market movements and for manufacturing to improve operations.

Optimization

Quantum computing can improve research and development, supply-chain optimization, and
production. For example, you could apply quantum computing to decrease manufacturing
process–related costs and shorten cycle times by optimizing elements such as path planning in
complex processes. Another application is the quantum optimization of loan portfolios so that
lenders can free up capital, lower interest rates, and improve their offerings.
Simulation
The computational effort required to simulate systems accurately scales exponentially with the
complexity of drug molecules and materials. Even using approximation methods, current
supercomputers cannot achieve the level of accuracy that these simulations demand. Quantum
computation has the potential to solve some of the most challenging computational problems
faced in chemistry, allowing the scientific community to do chemical simulations that are
intractable today. For example, Pasqal built their QUBEC computational software to run
chemistry simulations. QUBEC automates the heavy lifting necessary to run quantum
computational tasks from automatic provisioning of the computing infrastructure to running pre-
and post-processing classical calculations and performing error mitigation tasks.

How can you get started with quantum computing?

If you want to try quantum computing, you can get started with a quantum hardware emulator on
your local machine. Emulators are regular software that imitates quantum behavior on a classical
computer. They are predictable and allow you to see quantum states. They are useful if you want to

test your algorithms before investing in quantum hardware time. However, they cannot recreate real
quantum behavior.

You can also use a cloud quantum computing service to code on a true quantum computer without
investing in expensive hardware.

Resources:
extremely time-consuming for traditional computers.
Learn more:
1
What is Quantum Computing? | IBM

ibm.com
2
What is Quantum Computing? - Quantum …

aws.amazon.com

Minatalla Mamoun Awad Ali

Year 1 Class 10