IBM collaborates to accelerate quantum computing: Page 2 of 2

Global hubs for quantum research, education, industrial collaboration

IBM will establish regional hubs across four continents to increase access to quantum systems and advance research, which are critical for accelerated learning, skills development and implementation of quantum computing.

These IBM Q Network Hubs will broadly enable their industry and research collaborators to have online use of IBM Q systems and engage in joint development work to explore quantum computing. The planned locations for the hubs are at IBM Research, Keio University in Japan, Oak Ridge National Lab in the United States, Oxford University in the United Kingdom and the University of Melbourne in Australia.

"We are looking forward to performing state-of-the-art quantum computing research using IBM Q and guiding member companies of the hub to develop mission-oriented quantum software that will help their businesses," said Prof Kohei Itoh, the Dean of Faculty of Science and Technology, Keio University.

"Establishing ORNL as a hub of the IBM Q Network would again demonstrate that UT-Battelle is at the forefront of innovation, enabled by the world's most advanced computational systems, and will continue to drive transformational advancements in science and research," said associate laboratory director of the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) Jeff Nichols.

"NQIT's emulator program will work with IBM to convene scientists, engineers and industrial researchers and developers across a wider range of fields, from simulating new molecules to enhancing artificial intelligence to show how quantum computers can dramatically transform their ideas and businesses," said Prof. Ian Walmsley, Hooke Professor of Experimental Physics, Director of the Networked Quantum Information Technologies (NQIT) Hub and Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and Innovation, Oxford University.

"We are excited to work with IBM to explore how quantum computing could benefit Australian industry and education and address new computational challenges. By becoming an IBM Q Network hub and having access to advanced quantum systems, it will allow our scientists to develop knowledge for quantum solutions applicable to industry problems in Mining, Energy and Finance," said Professor Jim McCluskey, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research) at the University of Melbourne.

Growing quantum ecosystem

Through the publically available IBM Q Experience, more than 60,000 users have run more than 1.7 Mquantum experiments and generated over 35 third-party research publications using the world's first series of quantum computers available openly on the web.

The IBM Q Experience enables registered users to connect to IBM's quantum processors via the IBM Cloud, to run algorithms and experiments, work with the individual quantum bits, and explore tutorials and simulations around what might be possible with quantum computing. Developers also have access to IBM's open quantum software development kit, QISKit, to create and run quantum computing programs.

Enabling high quality academic research is one of the core principles of the IBM Q Experience, and now registered academic users can leverage the IBM Q Experience for deeper research collaboration. Professors and researchers will find customised tools designed to accelerate and differentiate their work including preferred queue access to IBM's quantum processors, the ability to link and tag their research to the IBM Q Experience, and channels to request new features and functionalities.

Users have registered from more than 1500 universities, 300 secondary schools, and 300 private institutions worldwide, many of whom are accessing the IBM Q Experience as part of their formal education.

The IBM Q Experience will also play a significant role in an initiative IBM is undertaking with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  IBM will support MIT in producing a leading edge, comprehensive curriculum for executives, engineers, scientists and researchers to understand and leverage the upcoming quantum computing revolution. The first courses are anticipated to go online in the first half of 2018 via the edX platform.

The curriculum will include a set of MIT-created massive open online courses (MOOCs) that will be offered both for free and for a fee to learners who desire an MIT-issued certificate of completion. The curriculum will also include a comprehensive professional development curriculum (MIT ProX courses). These latter courses will include online labs on quantum computing, which will utilise the public IBM Q Experience quantum computers.

In addition to supporting the quantum curriculum, IBM has started working with MIT to explore the intersection of quantum computing and machine learning as part of the recently launched MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab. Together, IBM and MIT scientists are investigating the ‘Physics of AI’, which involves new research into AI hardware materials, devices and architectures.

Focus areas include using AI to help characterise and improve quantum devices, and researching the use of quantum computing to optimise and speed up machine-learning algorithms and other AI applications.

IBM Research is announcing a series of prizes for professors, lecturers and students who use the IBM Q Experience and QISKit in the classroom or for their research. Awards will be made available for developing open source course materials for a lecture series; building Jupyter Notebook tutorials with QISKit; contributing specific code modules to the open source QISKit SDK and to students who publish a scientific paper that makes use of QISKit.

For details visit https://qe-awards.mybluemix.net

IBM Q Consulting

IBM is also introducing IBM Q Consulting, which brings together consultants, scientists and industry experts to help clients envision new business value through the application of quantum computing technology, and provide clients with customised roadmaps to help them become quantum ready.

With access to cutting-edge mathematics and engineering, IBM's quantum consultants and developers are applying their expertise to complex business problems. IBM Q Consulting is focusing initially in logistics and modelling use cases in industries such as mining, banking, life sciences and electronics. Clients can engage IBM Q Consulting immediately.

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