Written by AZoQuantumJun 17 2020

University of Sydney scientists have adapted methods from robotics and autonomous vehicles to efficiently evaluate the performance of quantum devicesa crucial process to help balance the emerging technologies.

The new method has been experimentally demonstrated to supersede the simplistic characterization of these settings by a factor of three, with a relatively higher outcome for more complicated simulated settings.

Using this approach, we can map the noise causing performance variations across quantum devices at least three times as quickly as a brute-force approach. Rapidly assessing the noise environment can help us improve the overall stability of quantum devices.

Riddhi Gupta, Study Lead Author and PhD Student, School of Physics, University of Sydney

The study has been published in Quantum Informationa Nature partner journal.

While quantum computing is still in its preliminary stages of development, it holds implications to redefine technologies by solving issues beyond the context of traditional computing.

One of the obstacles to produce these systems to practical scale is resolving the hardware imperfections. The rudimentary units of quantum technologythat is, quantum bits or qubitsare extremely responsive to disturbance from their settings such as electromagnetic noise and display performance changes that decrease their usefulness.

Ms Gupta, who is also a part of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems, has used methods from traditional estimation employed in robotics and modified them to enhance the performance of hardware. This was accomplished via the efficient automation of procedures that map both the performance changes and environment over massive quantum devices.

Our idea was to adapt algorithms used in robotics that map the environment and place an object relative to other objects in their estimated terrain. We effectively use some qubits in the device as sensors to help understand the classical terrain in which other qubits are processing information.

Riddhi Gupta, Study Lead Author and PhD Student, School of Physics, University of Sydney

In the field of robotics, machines depend on simultaneous localization and mapping, or SLAM for short, algorithms. Robotic vacuum cleaners are devices that constantly map their settings and then estimate their location inside that setting to move.

The problem with adapting SLAM algorithms to quantum systems is that if individuals define, or quantify, the performance of one qubit, they would damage its quantum data.

As such, Ms Gupta developed an adaptive algorithm that quantifies the performance of a single qubit and applies that data to predict the capabilities of neighboring qubits.

We have called this Noise Mapping for Quantum Architectures. Rather than estimate the classical environment for each and every qubit, we are able to automate the process, reducing the number of measurements and qubits required, which speeds up the whole process.

Riddhi Gupta, Study Lead Author and PhD Student, School of Physics, University of Sydney

Dr Cornelius Hempel, whose experimental group offered Ms Gupta data from experiments performed on a one-dimensional (1D) string of trapped ions, stated that he was happy to observe threefold enhancement even in the mapping of such a tiny quantum system.

However, when Riddhi modelled this process in a larger and more complex system, the improvement in speed was as high as twentyfold. This is a great result given the future of quantum processing is in larger devices, Dr Hempel added.

Professor Michael J. Biercuk, founder of quantum technology company Q-CTRL and director of the University of Sydney Quantum Control Laboratory in the Sydney Nanoscience Hub, is the supervisor of Ms Gupta.

This work is an exciting demonstration that state-of-the-art knowledge in robotics can directly shape the future of quantum computing. This was a first step to unify concepts from these two fields, and we see a very bright future for the continued development of quantumcontrol engineering, Professor Biercuk concluded.

The study was partly funded by the US Army Research Office, the ARC Centre of Excellence for Engineered Quantum Systems, and a private grant from H. & A. Harley.

Gupta, R. S., et al. (2020) Adaptive characterization of spatially inhomogeneous fields and errors in qubit registers. npj Quantum Information. doi.org/10.1038/s41534-020-0286-0.

Source: https://www.sydney.edu.au/

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New Way to Assess the Performance of Quantum Devices - AZoQuantum

Everyone learns differently, but cognitive research shows that you tend to remember things better if you use spaced repetition. That is, you learn something, then after a period, you are tested. If you still remember, you get tested again later with a longer interval between tests. If you get it wrong, you get tested earlier. Thats the idea behind [Andy Matuschak s]and [Michael Nielsens] quantum computing tutorial. You answer questions embedded in the text. You answer to yourself, so theres no scoring. However, once you click to reveal the answer, you report if you got the answer correct or not, and the system schedules you for retest based on your report.

Does it work? We dont know, but we have heard that spaced repetition is good for learning languages, among other things. We suspect that like most learning methods, it works better for some people than others.

Continue reading Learn Quantum Computing With Spaced Repetition

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Learn Quantum Computing With Spaced Repetition - Hackaday

The Digital Silk Road is one of the flagship projects in China's Belt & Road Initiative

The Digital Silk Road

As one of Chinas grand proposals within the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), the Digital Silk Road (DSR) project was introduced in March 2015.The DSR incorporates four interrelated, tech-focused components. First, China is investing resources into digital frameworks abroad, including fiber optic cable lines and data hubs. Secondly, the project focuses on creating cutting edge innovations - like satellite navigation systems and smart city projects - which will be fundamental in giving China an edge as a global economic and military power. China is working on rapidly expanding its area of DSR projects. In 2019, the Chinese government launched a new project called the "Belt and Road Digital Economy International Cooperation Initiative'' with a number of nations including the United Arab Emirates, Thailand, Turkey, Laos, Serbia, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and Egypt. The Chinese government also established cooperation agreements with 16 other countries to develop technology focused projects under the umbrella of the New Silk Road Initiative.

From a mid to long-term perspective, China plans to strategically fortify this digital initiative. In April of last year, a report published by the Office of the Leading Group for Promoting the Belt and Road Initiative highlighted that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has actively focused on the DSR Initiative with innovation-focused industrial frontier areas. These include cloud computing, nanotechnology, quantum computing, big data, artificial intelligence, and smart cities.

China has made significant telecom investments globally under its flagship Belt & Road Initiative

Impact of Covid-19

Covid-19 has significantly impacted the Chinese economy, particularly the small-medium enterprises. Thus, the governments fiscal and monetary policies have shifted focus on stabilizing the domestic economy. This has strongly impacted the BRI. However, the Information Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure projects are more cost-effective and can be completed at a faster pace compared to transportation and energy projects. Therefore, the DSR projects are more likely to attract significant investment and garner more interest from investors as compared to other BRI projects after Covid-19.

Is the Digital Silk Road a challenge and a national security threat to the US?

Fitch Solutions believes that the race in technological advancements will continue to be a key focal point of tension between the US and China. The Digital Silk Road is an essential pillar of China's global infrastructure strategy to manage the flow of data worldwide. Most of the infrastructure that is being used within the DSR projects involves little if any US technology, which is a cause of major concern for many Western policymakers and business executives. This is compounded by the fact that data traffic monitoring within China has greatly increased and thus the potential interference with sensitive monetary and security-related data could also be significantly compromised. Chinese tech firms have become highly proficient at using artificial intelligence (AI) to strengthen both their local businesses and relationships with consumers. The data and information accumulated from end-users will give Chinese companies considerably greater insights which will ultimately help them in gaining substantial market share within the BRI countries.

The Belt and Road Initiative supported by the DSR projects do not come without criticism and controversy. Critics have claimed that many Southeast Asian countries involved in the BRI have been drawn in by China's rigorous laws on the localization of data. However, some analysts argue that such changes are mostly being made to protect the information of citizens and incentivize foreign investments into local data hubs, rather than an inclination for ascribing to China's model of cyber administration. Nonetheless, the potential for these structures to be utilized by local governments to clamp down on social discord and political opponents cannot be ignored.

Smart City, Guangzhou Urban Skyline

The BRI has advanced Chinas technological prowess to the point where it now poses as the quintessential challenger to the US in terms of global technological partnerships. Earlier this year in February, the CCP made a concerted effort to focus on digital infrastructure projects including 5G expansions as one of the critical solutions to bolster their economy after the Covid-19 pandemic. Chinese companies such as Huawei Marine Networks have already laid down about 36,964 miles of undersea fibre optic cables in more than 95 different projects spanning the Indo-Pacific, South Pacific, and the Atlantic oceans. Chinese firms' global share in such transnational undersea cable projects have skyrocketed from a mere 7% in 2012 to 20% in 2019.

Expected market growth of 5G subscribers globally.

What choice will the US make?

American business leaders and the Trump administration are clearly intent on protecting US companies and supply chains from heavy reliance on China. For example, the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA)s recent $32B proposal aims to sharpen the edge of the US semiconductor industry. Semiconductor chips underpin some of the critical commercial and defense technologies of the future which include 5G networks and artificial intelligence. Furthermore, US Justice Department officials tacit pressure on a high-capacity undersea data cable system to bypass Hong Kong is a clear example that reflects Americas hardening stance on China.

In the Covid-19 era and especially given the acrimonious sentiment in Washington and Beijing with respect to Sino-US relations, it is incumbent to not forget that competition and cooperation have always defined US-China relations. The United States is currently losing the race against China in the digital space. However, that does not mean the race is over. Public-private partnerships are needed now more than ever. The US government and the private sector must invest significantly more resources into developing technology and advancing innovation at home. Failing to do so could risk the US permanently losing its global technological leadership to China.

A special thanks to Jeeho Bae and Yaser Faheem for contributing to this article.

Authors:

Mr. Earl Carr is the Vice President of International Research at Momentum Advisors, a New York based SEC-registered international wealth management firm. Jeeho Bae and Yaser Faheem are Research Consultants at Momentum Advisors.

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Is China Threatening Americas Dominance In The Digital Space? - Forbes

TWO scientists have received millions of pounds to build a piece of groundbreaking technology.

Dr Sebastian Weidt and Professor Winfried Hensinger, who both carry out research and teach at the University of Sussex, have secured 3.6 million investment for their plans for the worlds first large-scale quantum computer.

It puts them up against the likes of Google and IBM in a race to create what Sebastian described as the technology of the century.

He said: A quantum computer is a completely new computer. Its not the sort you have at your desk.

Its a machine which can solve certain problems that the most powerful conventional computer would take millions of years to solve.

Professor Winfried Hensinger and Dr Sebastian Weidt, founders of Universal Quantum

Unlike their competitors, who have designed quantum computers which use billions of laser beams for calculations at extremely cold temperatures marginally above minus 273C, Sebastian and Winfried have developed technology based on trapped ions, or charged atoms.

These atoms carry out calculations within the computer using microwave technology, such as that used in mobile phones, and do not need the same extreme cooling requirements.

It means their computer is more practical and can operate millions of qubits, or units of data, at the same time and solve complex problems.

Sebastian said their computer could be used to develop new drugs as it can work out chemical reactions very quickly and could also help in the development of Artificial Intelligence and machine learning technologies.

He said: Its an enabling technology which a lot of sectors will use to help them work out their own problems, just like we do now with conventional computers.

In ten or 20 years we will look back and think, this is the technology of the century.

Sebastian and Winfried, who founded their start-up company Universal Quantum in 2018, have been researching quantum mechanics for more than 20 years.

The pair have received funding from a number of investors including Hoxton Ventures, which was an early backer of Deliveroo, and Village Global, which is backed by the likes of Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos.

Sebastian said: Its very humbling and incredibly exciting as we have these leading investors who believe in our technology and our team.

Universal Quantum is really about taking the solutions we have developed through research at Sussex and putting them into practice.

Sebastian and Winfried are looking for a suitable facility in Brighton and Hove to begin the challenge of building the quantum computer and they will need to hire hundreds of engineers to help them.

Silicon microchips were used in Sebastian and Winfried's prototype for a large-scale quantum computer

Sebastian said: Its a long-term mission but we really wanted to do this in Brighton. We want the city to be a quantum technology hub.

We love Brighton and we actively chose not to go to the US or other places a lot of start-up companies like to go.

Winfried said: Quantum computing has the power to change the world for the better.

Were assembling the brightest minds to do just that, paving the way for a British start-up to lead the journey to a truly useful and usable one million qubit quantum computer.

Our large-scale quantum computers will one day allow us to tackle the grand global issues of our time, from creating new pharmaceuticals, revolutionising financial modelling, tackling optimisation problems, machine learning even helping to feed the worlds population by making fertiliser more efficiently.

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Brighton scientists in the race to build quantum computer - The Argus

PALO ALTO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--NTT Research, Inc., a division of NTT (TYO:9432), today announced that it has named Dr. Tetsuhiko Teshima as a Research Scientist in its Medical and Health Informatics (MEI) Lab. Dr. Teshima has also joined the Technical University of Munich (TUM) Neuroelectronics Group as a Visiting Researcher. NTT Research and TUM last fall entered into a joint research agreement to explore implantable electronic systems to affect the future of patient care. An expert in micro technologies, Dr. Teshima will be working full-time at TUM in the area of advanced neuroelectronics and biosensor technology. Dr. Teshima began his three-year appointment on March 1, 2020.

Dr. Teshimas research has covered a broad range of topics that overlap with the MEI Labs mission, including micro bio-nano interfaces, parasitology, soft matter, hierarchical self-assembly, thin-film manufacturing techniques, soft lithography, microfluidics, revolutionary tools for single-cell measurements, mechano-biology and three-dimensional synthetic tissue and organs. He comes to NTT Research after holding positions at NTTs Bio-medical Informatics Research Center, the National Institute of Science and Technology Policy (NISTEP) and NTTs Basic Research Laboratories. He holds a M.S. (biology) and Ph.D. (information science and technology) from the University of Tokyo, where he also held a Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) post-doctoral fellowship for three years at the Institute of Industrial Science.

Dr. Teshima is a top young scientist in Japan who has made a mark in various areas of micro technologies, said MEI Lab Director Hitonobu Tomoike. I expect a good chemical reaction between him and the brilliant scientists in Munich.

NTT Research also announced that it has named Vipul Goyal as Senior Scientist in its Cryptography and Information Security (CIS) Lab. Dr. Goyal is an associate professor of computer science, Carnegie Mellon University, which he joined in 2016. Previously, he spent seven years as a researcher in the Cryptography and Complexity Group at Microsoft Research, India. He is a winner of several honors, including a 2016 Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) test-of-time Award, a JP Morgan faculty fellowship, and a Google outstanding graduate student award. He received his Ph.D. at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Named to Forbes Magazines 30 Under 30 list of people changing science and healthcare in 2013, Dr. Goyal has published more than 80 technical papers. Broadly interested in all areas of cryptography, he has a particular focus on the foundations of the field. His current research topics include secure multi-party computation, non-malleable cryptography and foundations of blockchains.

Also joining the CIS Lab is Justin Holmgren as Scientist. Prior to his current role at NTT Research, Dr. Holmgren was a Google Research Fellow at the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing. Dr. Holmgren was previously a post-doctoral research fellow at Princeton University and received his Ph.D. in 2018 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), where he was advised by Professor Shafi Goldwasser. His work, which includes 15 published papers, has notably advanced the feasibility of securely outsourcing computation, private information retrieval and software watermarking. At NTT Research, he will be studying the foundational theory of cryptography, along with its interplay with diverse areas of computer science.

We are delighted to welcome Drs. Goyal and Holmgren on our journey to a more secure future for everyone, said CIS Lab Director Tatsuaki Okamoto. Only by engaging the strongest and most dedicated researchers can we address the foundational research problems in cryptography, and so deliver long-term impact to the field.

In related personnel news, NTT Research last month announced the appointment of Joe Alexander (M.D., Ph.D.) as Distinguished Scientist in the MEI Lab and Hoeteck Wee as a Senior Scientist in the CIS Lab. Dr. Alexander is leading the MEI Labs bio digital twin initiative. In February, NTT Research announced that the CIS Lab had reached joint research agreements with UCLA and Georgetown University, covering theoretical aspects of cryptography and global scale blockchain testbed research, respectively. NTT Researchs Physics and Informatics (PHI) Lab last year reached joint research agreements with six universities, one government agency and one quantum computing software company.

About NTT Research

NTT Research opened its Palo Alto offices in July 2019 as a new Silicon Valley startup to conduct basic research and advance technologies that promote positive change for humankind. Currently, three labs are housed at NTT Research: the Physics and Informatics (PHI) Lab, the Cryptography and Information Security (CIS) Lab, and the Medical and Health Informatics (MEI) Lab. The organization aims to upgrade reality in three areas: 1) quantum information, neuro-science and photonics; 2) cryptographic and information security; and 3) medical and health informatics. NTT Research is part of NTT, a global technology and business solutions provider with an annual R&D budget of $3.6 billion.

NTT and the NTT logo are registered trademarks or trademarks of NIPPON TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE CORPORATION and/or its affiliates. All other referenced product names are trademarks of their respective owners. 2020 NIPPON TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE CORPORATION

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NTT Research Builds Upon its Micro Technologies and Cryptography Expertise with Distinguished New Hires - Business Wire