What I Think About When I Think About Quantum
By Marta Piekarska-Geater
Quantum Technology, that’s a very loaded term, isn’t it? Put it in your browser of choice and you will get anything from “here is how Quantum will destroy your business”, “Quantum Computers as the greatest threats to our security” all the way to “the world is changing, and Quantum Technology is paving the path” or “Quantum Technology unlocks the greatest potential in the history of computing”. In all of this noise, how should you think of quantum technologies? How to separate speculation, science and sensationalism?
It is always a good idea to start with the basics – what is quantum mechanics and why are we making such a big deal out of it? The world of quantum physics is one where the classical rules do not apply. It is mindboggling at best and quite disturbing at times. The headline is simple “Quantum Mechanics describes the probability of finding a particle in a given state”. Let’s pause for a second, though – the probability? Clearly, this implies that a particle can be in more than one state at any given time? Well, no – it can be only in a single state. But we don’t know which one it is. In a way – it always is in all the states, just with a different probability.
Think of a cat shut in a room, behind a closed door. You don’t know for how long the cat has been there. You have no idea if it is there - at all. You can make some observations – is there a meow? Does it seem there is some movement? Until the door is opened – the probability of the cat being well and happy, slightly grumpy and aggressive, or just dead – are all equal. Similarly, quantum mechanics see systems as groups of particles (Qubits), such as the spin of an electron or the orientation of a photon, and measures their probability of being in some arrangement. The sum of all those probabilities has to add up to one. The idea, that they can be in many different states at once, is known as superposition. When Qubits are joined together, we speak of entanglement. A fascinating thing happens the number of states that can be expressed simultaneously doubles, with each additional Qubit.
Great, so we covered the quantum mechanics (interesting stuff) but how does it make a difference for us, people who deal with the internet and computers, not physicists in a lab?
Computers are just machines processing streams of information. No matter if it is a cute cat picture, the latest Taylor Swift music release or an email to your boss – it all just becomes one long parade of zeroes and ones, called bits. To increase the richness of the information, each 8 bits are combined into a byte, meaning that each byte has 256 permutations. This is enough to encode a letter, a colour or a piece of sound. But computers are deterministic, or binary – all 8 pieces of a byte must be either 0 or 1, so each byte has a set value. On the other hand, computers utilizing quantum mechanics, allow us to process information in parallel and proceed with both states. It is a little bit like going through the “choose your own adventure” show on 2 simultaneous screens, and every time you make a choice, adding more screens to see which of the outcomes you like the best. If you have an eight-qubit computer (as opposed to 8 bit), you can process all 256 states at the same time.
The beauty of quantum computers lies in their being based on how nature works, not how humans think. Classic computers started as machines that aided humans by providing faster calculations. The way that we calculate things is very linear. The way that we see the world, in general, is based on a set of observations and conclusions, or “if…then…” statements. This is how computers work, as well, because they are human-made machines.
On the other hand – quantum computers base on how nature works. It is not linear, and it is not 100% predictable. Or rather, it can be, but we do not know what are the factors impacting each outcome. So while traditional computing mimics how humans think, quantum computing can reflect how the world works.
This property of being able to consider many states in parallel is what gives quantum computers an edge over classical ones, but only if there are big data sets or possible combinations in play – say, finding an optimal route for a cargo delivery or a prime factor of a large number. Measuring the advantage of quantum computing isn’t as simple as one would think: quantum supremacy describes problems that cannot be solved (or would take unreasonably long) with traditional methods; quantum advantage refers to ones that can be solved but would take much, much longer. Then there is a whole set of problems that don’t really benefit from quantum computers. In the latter case, it may even be decremental to apply quantum.
Qubits are very sensitive creatures – even the slightest environmental change can change their state, which will completely throw off the whole calculation. Today, most quantum computers (more on that in another episode), need to be cooled down to minus 237 degrees Celsius and kept in very strict conditions, and even then, the superposition can only be kept for a few hundred milliseconds before the quantum system loses its capabilities. We deal with this by designing self-controlling systems – we use some of the Qubits to check the calculations. Today we need about a 1000 physical Qubits to create a single logical Qubit.
What defines a practical quantum computer? Physicist David DiVincenzo lists the following properties:
Physically scalable to increase the number of qubits
Qubits that can be initialized to arbitrary values
Quantum gates that are faster than decoherence time
Universal gate set
Qubits that can be read easily
No matter how much you believe in Quantum Computing, one thing is sure. It is an amazing opportunity to look at your work, products and systems from a different perspective. While we are sure bits are still more valuable than qubits, it is a journey of thinking outside of the box (or the room you left your cat in).
Should you care about Quantum? Yes. Definitely. We can be sure that new business models will emerge and what we find on our way, will be very beneficial in other areas. And we are not alone in that belief: in a study done on 100 executives, over 65% said that quantum computing will significantly change the business model used in their organization or company in the next 10 years – either by accelerating the changes already taking place or causing new disruptions.
Many like to pose the emergence of Quantum Technologies as a threat to humanity – what will we do when those super smart machines take over the world?! The truth is that it won’t happen overnight, and we have months and years to apply the learnings from the discovery process to improving our systems. A great example can be taken from the area of security– Quantum Machines are great at solving the factorisation problems, which common encryption relies on – it is very easy to multiply two numbers, but finding a factor of a large one is extremely hard in classic computing. So yes, all the information that is encrypted - using algorithms like RSA will be easily accessible to anyone with a Quantum Computer. However, in the process of building general-purpose quantum computers, we learned so much that we were able to discover encryption algorithms that will not be cracked. We have advanced the field and built better security standards thanks to the research in Quantum Technologies.
Some of the main areas EQAL will be paying attention to are optimization, simulation, machine learning and cryptography. You may be curious why we are putting our focus on these fields. This is because they particularly benefit from the features of Quantum Technologies, and often fall into the category of NP-problems – those that are not solvable by traditional computers in polynomial time. This, of course, is not an exhaustive list, and that is why we are so excited to launch EQAL and see what brilliant applications our members will find. It is a well-known psychological fact – we are only afraid of things that we don’t understand, ones that are mysterious to us. EQAL is a safe space where researchers, companies and government can learn and collaborate to understand what it means to live in a post-quantum world. To see the emergence of Quantum Technologies as a massive opportunity.
Access the programme preview here.
About Marta Piekarska-Geater
An expert in Open Source and Ecosystem Leadership, Marta has an impressive background in security and a track record of leading communities in many organizations including Consensys, Balancer Labs, The Linux Foundation, Hyperledger, the Sovrin Foundation, and consulting for numerous startups.
She is also a regular public speaker and mentor and been recognised with awards such as CryptoAM’s Most Influential Person in Blockchain, Consensys’ Women in Crypto, and Coindesk's Top 100 people in Blockchain. Marta holds a Ph.D. in Computer Security and Privacy and worked in this field with Apple, Blockstream, Mozilla, Deutsche Telekom, and others.
She is a founder of the W3C Blockchain Community Group and presently serves as Chair of the Sovrin Technical Governing Board.
Marta is passionate about communities (DAO governance), collaboration (decentralisation and blockchain) and cooking.
About EQAL
EdenBase Quantum Applications Lab (EQAL) is an ecosystem and a hub established to enable collaboration between companies, technologists, researchers, funding partners and those interested in the future of this step change in technology to explore the applications of Quantum Technologies. EQAL’s mission is to enable all businesses and stakeholders to understand how to prepare to be Quantum-safe, and also be ready to take advantage of a Post Quantum world. Access the programme preview here.
EQAL is a division of EdenBase operating within the EdenBase Hubs and ecosystem.
About EdenBase
EdenBase is a fund, hub and ecosystem supercharging the next set of Game Changers, powered by Frontier Technologies. By building a community and ecosystem, EdenBase supports portfolio companies to deliver responsible growth and valued impact to create a better future.
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