SBIR-STTR Award

Quantum computing technologies have now reached sufficient scale and maturity that it is possible to interrogate real-world applications at a non-simulatable scale, and with the potential to outperform their classical counterparts on specific tasks (so-called “Quantum Advantage”). At the same time, they have not yet achieved such maturity as to allow the hardware to be ed in a way to permit practical algorithms design without taking account of real device architecture, understanding sources of error, and closely coupling the inspiration for algorithms with the mitigation of hardware-imposed constraints. This program capitalizes on recent breakthrough improvements in neutral-atom quantum computing architectures to develop new, and native, algorithms with promise for quantum speedup on near-term devices. If successful in identifying new hardware-specific algorithms, it would proceed to implement them on commercial hardware, validate their performance on simulable scales, and measure results beyond that scale. In phase I of this program, QuEra’s algorithm team and the Harvard team will work closely to develop near-term quantum algorithms and gate designs native to the neutral-atom hardware being built at QuEra. Specifically, this effort would develop new methods of quantum optimization, high-fidelity multi-qubit gate operations and efficient compilation, and new applications in the NMR spectral inference problem; these developments will heavily rely on the expertise of these collaboration on neutral-atom NISQ algorithm development, neutral-atom quantum gate designs, quantum optimal control, and quantum machine learning. The close coupling between algorithm and hardware design will permit iterative approaches to be taken, in which new algorithmic insight can guide machine design, and real-device implementation can guide analysis of subsequent generations of algorithms. Taken together, these efforts hold the promise to dramatically alter the landscape for commercial cloud computing for both civil and military applications, and directly address the unique hardware advantages and constraints of the most highly scalable platform, now based on neutral atoms.

Rapid experimental progress has recently propelled leading quantum computing platforms to such a scale and level of programmability that it is now not only impossible to simulate them classically, but also conceivable that they are useful for problems of practical commercial importance today. However, every quantum computing platform has its own native qubit architecture, connectivity, and programmability, and entails different physical design tradeoffs in scale and programmability. It is thus imperative in the near term that quantum algorithms and hardware designs be developed hand-in-hand, and in an iterative feedback approach. Extending our efforts for hardware-guided algorithm development in phase I of the AFRL STTR program (Contract Number FA8750-20-P-1708), we proceed with intimate co-design between quantum algorithms and hardware development in phase II of the DARPA STTR program. The core of these co-design efforts is the neutral-atom quantum computing machine recently constructed at QuEra. To be fully guided by real device capabilities, constraints, and dominant error sources, algorithm development will be conducted by a collaboration between QuEra’s algorithm and hardware teams, and the newly established quantum theory group led by Dries Sels at NYU. Phase II will demonstrate and explore on real hardware the algorithms developed throughout phase I and II in areas of optimization, machine learning, high-fidelity quantum gates, and NMR spectral inference. Phase II efforts can be divided into three main thrusts. T1 focuses on applications of quantum optimization and quantum machine learning using algorithms native to the neutral-atom hardware implementation, which can be directly scaled up to hundreds of qubits, a scale where it becomes feasible to explore quantum advantage on hard classical problems. T2 focuses on the design and implementation of high-fidelity multi-qubit gates on neutral-atom architectures. The optimized pulse design delves into the low-level working mechanism of the hardware and has the potential to make the building blocks of universal quantum computation based on neutral atoms simpler and more robust. T3 is concerned with the design of a neutral-atom architecture to perform NMR inference, a promising candidate for robust quantum advantage using current technologies. All components of the research proposed in phase II were selected for their high degree of impact on commercialization pathways for neutral atom quantum computing and taken together they form a robust approach toward validating the utility, accelerating adoption, and broadening use of the platform in each of the proposed areas. With the uniquely close coupling between algorithm and hardware development within this program, we aim to accelerate the establishment of quantum advantage on practical applications using near-term quantum devices, and expedite commercialization potential in optimization, machine learning, quantum simulation, and metabolomics.