The Quantum Leap: How Quantum Computing Redefines What's Possible

Quantum computing is set to transform how we solve some of the world's biggest problems, from accelerating medical breakthroughs to tackling climate challenges. But how does it work, and why is it so powerful?

In this Dornsife Dialogues, leaders in the field explained the basics of quantum computing and discussed the incredible potential it holds for shaping our future.

Moderated by Moh El-Naggar, Interim Dean, USC Dornsife; Dean's Professor of Physics and Astronomy and Professor of Physics and Astronomy and Chemistry

With:

• Rosa Di Felice, professor of physics and astronomy and quantitative and computational biology, USC Dornsife
• Daniel Lidar, Viterbi professorship in engineering and professor of electrical engineering systems, USC Viterbi; professor of chemistry, physics and astronomy, USC Dornsife

Learn more about the Dornsife Dialogues and sign up for the next live event here.

Transcript

00:00:01:19 - 00:00:32:23

Unknown

Welcome to the podcast version of Dornsife Dialogs, hosted by the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences. Conversations feature our distinguished scholars, alumni and other thought leaders discussing the fascinating issues that matter to you. You can also find video recordings of these discussions on the USC Dornsife YouTube channel. We begin this Dornsife dialog with an introduction from interim Dean Mo Al-Najjar

00:00:33:01 - 00:00:33:21

Unknown

Good afternoon

00:00:34:02 - 00:00:52:21

Unknown

it is my privilege today to moderate this session of the Dornsife dialogs. And I would like to start by welcoming our audience. Attendance and later views of this dialog series continues to grow. Thanks to your curiosity and interest in the insight and research of our leading USC Dornsife scholars and alumni,

00:00:52:21 - 00:01:00:16

Unknown

many know USC as the home of an outstanding education, topnotch experience and excellence in athletics.

00:01:00:18 - 00:01:25:09

Unknown

But USC is also an elite research university at the forefront of many fields, and this is especially in the rapidly moving field of quantum information, science and technology. In fact, the Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and the Viterbi School of Engineering recently partnered to kick off a unified quantum initiative as part of the recently announced USC Frontiers of Computing Initiative.

00:01:25:11 - 00:01:37:10

Unknown

Now, it's completely understandable if the quantum world makes your head spin. What's up with Schrödinger's cat? Superposition, entanglement and qubits and what exactly is a quantum computer?

00:01:37:10 - 00:01:51:12

Unknown

Whether you're an aficionado or just quantum curious, We've got your back with two leading experts who I have the privilege of working with as colleagues at USC, Professor Daniel Lider and Professor Rosetta Fletcher.

00:01:51:13 - 00:01:53:15

Unknown

I'll start with a quick introduction.

00:01:53:15 - 00:02:19:16

Unknown

Professor Daniel Leeder holds the Viterbi Professorship in Engineering and is a professor of electrical and computer Engineering and the Majority School of Engineering and of Chemistry and Physics and Astronomy at the Dornsife College of Letters Arts and Sciences. He is the director of the USC Center for Quantum Information Science and Technology and directs the USC, IBM Quantum Innovation Center, which provides access to cutting edge quantum computers for our students and researchers.

00:02:19:16 - 00:02:31:00

Unknown

Daniel is a leading researcher in Quantum information processing, focusing on quantum error correction, which is one of the key challenges that must be overcome for quantum computing to make a difference in people's lives.

00:02:31:00 - 00:02:46:13

Unknown

He is the recipient of countless prestigious honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship and I believe Fellowship. And the Triple AC Fellowship is an author, a coauthor of more than 130 technical research articles and holds for patents.

00:02:46:15 - 00:02:57:01

Unknown

I'd also like to welcome Professor Rosa differently each day. Rosa is a professor of physics and astronomy and quantitative and computational biology in the Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences.

00:02:57:01 - 00:03:13:16

Unknown

Rose's expertise, amongst many things is in quantum computing and materials science, with a particular focus on applying quantum computation to challenges in nanoscience and simulations of molecules, which going to talk about today, very recently, just a few weeks ago, in fact.

00:03:13:16 - 00:03:39:00

Unknown

She is part of a team that includes a master's student from the joint program in Quantum Information Science with the Potrebbe School of Engineering and the Dornsife College were recognized as winners of the Quantum Mobility Challenge, sponsored by Airbus and BMW. Rosa is an author of more than 120 papers in international peer reviewed top quality journals. So welcome, Daniel, and welcome Rosa.

00:03:39:00 - 00:03:46:11

Unknown

I would like to start from the very, very beginning by asking you to explain to our audience

00:03:46:11 - 00:04:21:09

Unknown

what is quantum based on What makes it so different than regular computing. Daniel, let's start with you perhaps. Okay. So quantum computing is based on quantum bits. Those are sometimes known as qubits. A standard bit, which is the fundamental unit of information in your desktop or laptop can be in two states, zero or one, as we typically call them, and a quantum bit a qubit can be in a superposition of and one, which is where the famous Schrödinger cat analogy comes into play.

00:04:21:11 - 00:04:44:06

Unknown

Now we prefer zero and one to dead and alive. And if you take a lot of these qubits together, you get a gigantic superposition. If you have ten such qubits, you get two to the power, ten to get. If you take 100 qubits, you get 2 to 100 and so on. Different states that can all be represented simultaneously in a quantum computer.

00:04:44:06 - 00:05:16:19

Unknown

And a quantum computer can do something very interesting and different with this giant superposition. It can, in essence, compute on all of these different numbers simultaneously. So it's as if it's simultaneously evolving to to the power 100 or two of the power 1000 different numbers simultaneously in order to try to find the answer to some computational problem. And it does so using additional important quantum features, not just this idea of superposition.

00:05:16:19 - 00:05:37:11

Unknown

In addition, there are effects like interference and entanglement and sometimes tunneling, which are all important buzzwords. We delve that aid the speed up that we get from quantum computers and speed up is really the key gain that we get from this massive parallelism that a quantum computer provides.

00:05:37:11 - 00:05:44:07

Unknown

Is it fair? Most of our audience obviously will be familiar with what a regular computer looks like.

00:05:44:08 - 00:06:06:03

Unknown

And I want to make this a little bit concrete for people. When we talk about a bit, that can be a zero or one. I think to most people they have a realization that in their regular everyday computers. This thing is some element inside their computer that is a transistor and so on. Rosa, can you give us a sense when we're talking about a qubit in the case of a quantum computer, what physically are we talking about?

00:06:06:14 - 00:06:42:22

Unknown

Yes, that's exactly what I want to add. On top of Danielle presented pretty well. So again, in classical computers, we have the transistor in quantum computers. So how do you realize a beat and a quantum IQ bit? Sorry, we do not have a unique technology so far. We have different technologies. And so the IBM quantum computers are based on super superconducting devices.

00:06:42:22 - 00:07:24:13

Unknown

So which are junctions between different superconducting materials operated with electrical pulses and magnetic pulses. But there are alternatives. So alternatives are ion traps which are in ions cell, which are charged oxygens trapped in specific locations and manipulated in these locations with lasers and optical tweezers. It could be neutral atoms, it could be neutral molecules, and it could be topological material, as Microsoft just announced, for instance.

00:07:24:15 - 00:07:41:05

Unknown

So all these technologies are currently explored there. Again, the most advanced are currently as the superconducting technologies are, but we don't know now if that is the ultimate technology to unravel the power of quantum computers.

00:07:41:05 - 00:07:51:17

Unknown

So that makes sense. So essentially the idea is if you need to exploit these features of the quantum world, you have to go to actual quantum things in order to realize your computing.

00:07:51:17 - 00:08:21:03

Unknown

Those could be electrons, could be atoms, could be ions or features of these systems like superconductor ability that allow you to actually take advantage of these weird quantum properties of the world in order to do computing. A question I frequently get asked is why USC? What is USC's history in this area? And I'm very proud of the fact that USC was faculty and top researchers in this area.

00:08:21:03 - 00:08:37:16

Unknown

I would say well before quantum Computer sort of entered the lives of everyday people where before they realized and you could actually buy them in their current forms. Danielle, could you give us a sense of history of when USC started working on quantum computing? What are our strengths in this area?

00:08:37:16 - 00:08:52:01

Unknown

Yeah, so USC had an effort in quantum computing way before it became very popular and a feature in the media, it started around, I want to say early 2000s.

00:08:52:06 - 00:09:17:19

Unknown

There were several faculty here that were active in the field and just to calibrate, the whole field really exploded in the mid-nineties when Peter Shaw announced the discovery of the what is now famously known as Shaw's algorithm, an algorithm for breaking RS, a public key encryption. It took it took several years for the community to to really pick this up.

00:09:17:19 - 00:09:50:22

Unknown

But at USC, like I said, it took about five years for people to start to work on online computing here. Since Shaw's announcement. And then there started a series of hiring of faculty, including myself, I arrived in 2005. Our colleague Todd Bryan was already here working actively in computing, and then we established our first center, our Center for Quantum Formation, Science and Technology, shortly thereafter.

00:09:51:00 - 00:10:19:13

Unknown

And we've been hiring in this area steadily and have gotten some of the very top people to come and join us. I would say things took a turn when we started the USC at the time, USC, Lockheed Martin Quantum Computing Center, and that was in 2011, and that's when we got the very first commercial quantum computer that was ever sold, and that's the D-Wave Machine.

00:10:19:13 - 00:10:57:01

Unknown

And so USC has been the proud home of the D-Wave Quantum Enabler, as it's called since 2011. We've upgraded it a number of times and we're still one of the very few research universities in the world, in fact, any beyond universities in the world that have an actual computer on premise available to our researchers here. And then very recently we joined forces with with IBM and we established the the USC, IBM Quantum Innovation Center, of which Rosa and I are co-directors.

00:10:57:03 - 00:11:30:21

Unknown

And that gives us access, as you said in your intro. Now to the the fleet of very powerful modern IBM quantum computers. So we've had a long history of continuous activity in this area with what's important results and pretty much the whole spectrum of activity in this field, both theoretical and experimental and spanning various modalities. Cuban of the type that Rosa described, and also many different areas of of the theory of quantum computing.

00:11:30:23 - 00:11:52:05

Unknown

And we also have now a master's program that is training the next generation of scientists who are working in this area alongside, of course, are thriving Ph.D. program. I wanted to actually you about this a little bit, so I'll come in a moment. I'll come to ask you about the kinds of problems and advances that can be accomplished by quantum computing.

00:11:52:05 - 00:12:18:23

Unknown

But before get there. So here we are. We are now the home to a quantum computer. We now have this agreement with IBM that gives our students access to quantum computers on the cloud. I'd like to get a sense from you of the training that we are providing to students, both on the Ph.D. level and the Master's Rosa, I know you teach in that program that actually teaches quantum algorithms to students.

00:12:19:04 - 00:12:27:02

Unknown

Can you give us a sense of the skills that you want students to acquire and also how you think this helps their career going their careers going forward?

00:12:27:02 - 00:12:44:05

Unknown

Yeah, let me go a little bit broader than my course. Danielle is teaching in the in the Master himself, and he's teaching actually two courses. So we have a breadth of courses.

00:12:44:07 - 00:13:28:08

Unknown

Mine in particular is about applications of quantum computing. And so I offer as an instructional modules, the hardware that is available, the software that is available for different possible realizations of quantum computation, that's and, and then we use the IBM quantum devices and we the D-Wave Quantum Manila to run some programs. So I intentionally designed this since the very beginning to not necessarily being very deep but being practical.

00:13:28:08 - 00:14:03:01

Unknown

I saw at the end they should get familiar in using the quantum software that is available at least on these two platforms. So I also invited them to explore other platforms, but that's not straightforward them because some other platform platforms are commercial lab, both for software and hardware. So it's marginally doable. That's the other and, and the students that we have usually have a background in computer science, engineering, physics or chemistry.

00:14:03:01 - 00:14:45:09

Unknown

I would say there is even one student now who has a bachelor in biophysics and that what they need in order to succeed in the in the master is a strong foundation in computation. We mostly give them the foundations in quantum physics within the master. It's also because there is I mean, they start with a course on introduction to quantum information science, which which is about quantum mechanics with the angle of quantum information science.

00:14:45:11 - 00:15:29:12

Unknown

I mean, of course if they come with physical knowledge, they can get farther in carrying out practical research projects. If they do not come with that physical background, that still they can succeed and get out with the knowledge in the the notions of physics that are strictly needed and some advanced concepts like quantum error correction and even quantum cryptography, because we have some courses in computer science on now on quantum cryptography and let me add to that, if you don't mind, Rosa.

00:15:29:12 - 00:16:03:03

Unknown

So actually I want to emphasize that some of our early students went on to join the founding pioneering efforts at the likes of Google and IBM, especially at Google, the team that was formed there actually was was based entirely out of USC. Initially, some of the people that founded the program there got their Ph.D. under my guidance and and other faculty here.

00:16:03:05 - 00:16:25:14

Unknown

So we feel that we've contributed really to the really the founding of of this area outside of academia. It's been it's been a wonderful experience to see these people thrive in these companies. And some of them have gone on and started their own startups. And we're very much in contact with these graduates of ours who are making us very proud.

00:16:25:16 - 00:16:51:04

Unknown

It's not that not a week that goes by working at a research university like ours, where I don't tell people that the biggest joy that we have is watching what our people or our students, what our trainees do after they leave. USC. And you've just highlighted an extremely powerful example of that. Here is a technology that is just taking off that the public is now aware of that is moving very, very rapidly.

00:16:51:06 - 00:17:19:19

Unknown

And some of the people that are key drivers in this technology essentially were trained here at USC. I want to I want to zoom out for a second. Imagine you're not a master's or Ph.D. student in science Engineering, was working on quantum hardware or quantum computing or quantum algorithms. Imagine that. Like many of our viewers and listeners you're just wondering, okay, so here's a new computing technology.

00:17:19:20 - 00:17:43:06

Unknown

It is nothing like existing classical computing, nothing like my regular computer and. The technology is rapidly evolving. What difference will it make to my life? Well, it's just the take place of my regular computer. Can only solve very specific problems. Are the exciting problems that I that I should care about. I'll put this question in front of both of you.

00:17:43:06 - 00:18:09:09

Unknown

Yeah. So certainly computers are not going to replace your your email program or your web, although, you know, people have have been pessimistic about computing technology in the past improving have been proven very wrong. So I say that with with some humility, but that that's I'm fairly confident that's not where the power of quantum computing is going to be.

00:18:09:11 - 00:18:39:19

Unknown

Rather, quantum computing is about solving hard problems, computational problems much more efficiently than is possible classically, and we know of several application areas that are going to change people's lives where this is quite likely to come true. And the first of these has to do with what we call quantum simulation. So quantum simulation is the idea that you need to simulate a quantum system somehow efficiently.

00:18:39:21 - 00:19:07:18

Unknown

And Feynman, the famous physicist, originally thought of the idea of computing already in the eighties, in fact, with this in mind. So the idea that it's really hard to simulate mechanics itself using ordinary, what we call classical computer, your laptop, your desktop, but that if you had somehow you had a quantum computer, you could program it could do this simulation of a quantum system much more efficiently, exponentially more efficiently.

00:19:07:20 - 00:19:36:19

Unknown

And the reason I say that this is going to have an impact on people's lives is because while it might sound esoteric to simulate quantum mechanics, it actually has dramatic implications in areas such as materials science research, the world of looking for new drugs. Those are two key application areas. And why is that as well? New materials or or new pharmaceuticals to discover them.

00:19:36:21 - 00:19:57:12

Unknown

You could do something extremely hard, which is to go and build them in the lab and it's very costly. You can do something else that's very hard that you can try to simulate them on, on a classical computer. But because these are fundamentally quantum processes that need to be simulated to discover new materials, to find new pharmaceuticals, the best thing you can do is to simulate them on a quantum computer.

00:19:57:12 - 00:20:22:03

Unknown

And this is where there's a tremendous amount of excitement right now and innovation and promise and we think that we soon ish it's hard to give a precise timeline, but let's say it's maybe 5 to 10 years away. We'll be able to actually crack some really hard problems in these areas. And maybe you will discover something as revolutionary as a room temperature superconductor.

00:20:22:07 - 00:20:51:19

Unknown

I mean, that would just dramatically change the world if we could have room temperature superconductors by room temperature. Really what I mean is, you know, it's a technical term. What I mean is that superconductors operate at ordinary, not super cold outer space type temperatures, but in ordinary circumstances. And if you have a room temperature superconductor like that, you can imagine frictionless power transport, for example, and which would just be amazing in terms of the energy economy.

00:20:51:21 - 00:21:24:16

Unknown

Or you could imagine building maglev trains or even maglev roads where cards or cars are are floating frictionless. So dramatic cost reductions and energy associated with Earth transportation. Likewise, if we could develop pharmaceuticals from scratch very efficiently on a quantum computer, then you can imagine a new world of discovery, of new drugs that could fight diseases. All of these things are within realistic reach of the quantum computing revolution.

00:21:24:18 - 00:21:46:13

Unknown

Look, thank you. Thank you for making that very clear, Daniel. That very clear distinction that when we tell people quantum computers are very good at solving or simulating quantum systems, this is actually people's lives, right? Drug discovery can be a quantum problem. The discovery of the next solar panel material that goes on people's homes is a quantum problem.

00:21:46:15 - 00:22:14:07

Unknown

The discovery of a superconductor is a quantum problem. So when So here. So here you are. You heard it, folks. If if people say quantum computers are very good at simulating quantum systems, we are talking about things that impact our everyday lives. I want to bring up a couple of very concrete examples. Since we are talking about simulations, we actually subrosa, this is for you that you recently won an award, this quantum mobility challenge for doing quantum simulation wins.

00:22:14:09 - 00:22:54:06

Unknown

Tell us a little bit about that project and please jump in and tell us anything else that you have on your mind about simulation of quantum systems. Yeah. Okay. Thanks. More I'm sorry for interrupting. Let me first comment on the discovery of the room temperature superconductors and then I'll get to that to the transportation industry. So discovering I mean, I told you earlier that the chips that realize qubits are built with superconducting materials and those superconducting materials nowadays that have that have to be refrigerated to very, very low temperatures, which make process very costly.

00:22:54:08 - 00:23:43:11

Unknown

So finding room temperature superconductors would also impact the sustainability of quantum computers themselves. So now coming to your end about the transportation industry. So in the transportation industry, one problem, one fundamental problem is corrosion. Now one practical problem, sorry, not fundamental is corrosion, because materials I mean the surface is of animal be also and cars are formed by aluminum alloys that undergo corrosion when exposed to ambient or also by friction with other materials in the components of all the car.

00:23:43:13 - 00:24:23:11

Unknown

Now how do we prevent corrosion? Corrosion is banned. It can be dangerous for operation and is costly because the the the cars have to be replaced and the aero mobiles have to replaced very often. So how do we prevent it with the coating? So and coatings are normally formed by molecules. So now these molecules have to by bind pretty strongly to the surfaces of the aluminum alloys in order to create a stable film and that's that means reorganizing the electrons in the molecules.

00:24:23:11 - 00:25:03:13

Unknown

So when they are absorbed on the on the surface, this is a quantum. And if we can map it on a quantum computer, then we can predict the energies potentially with a very high precision which is needed to translate the science to technology industrial level class. Now, what what we did in the challenge is to demonstrate a protocol that uses quantum computer as a computation as an edge technology to predict the binding energies for these systems.

00:25:03:14 - 00:25:38:06

Unknown

The protocol goes all the way from database analysis for molecules and materials from classical computation. So a bridge between classical and quantum computation, and then the quantum using the IBM devices and the ion q wac of Amazon bracket devices that made available to us within the challenge from the from the organizers and, and sponsors. So I'm continuing to work on these project.

00:25:38:08 - 00:26:08:20

Unknown

I like data and, and there's a lot more to do at the I mean, in terms of algorithm development and theoretical foundations in in addition to running. So it's clear that there's a lot of movement in developing new hardware. It is clear that there's a lot of movement in new algorithms. It is also clear to people now that these problems, ones that do affect people's lives.

00:26:08:20 - 00:26:19:05

Unknown

So then the natural question that would then come up is what's the hurdle? What is the thing that needs to be solved in order for quantum computing to fulfill this promise?

00:26:19:05 - 00:26:32:13

Unknown

Yeah. So this brings us to why you, Mo, are not sitting simultaneously where you are and at the back of your room there on this other chair. In other words, why are you not in a superposition?

00:26:32:15 - 00:27:14:19

Unknown

Why am I not the cat? Right? Why are you not the cat? Why wasn't any of us Schrödinger's cat right now it's. And the reason for that is the same reason that it's so fiendishly hard to build scalable quantum computers. It's something called decoherence. It's a phenomenon, a natural phenomenon, which, to use another technical term, collapses the superposition of quantum states, basically, it's it's this that every time a quantum entity of some sort, be it an electron or a larger object like a molecule or presumably even a cat enters into a superposition state as soon as there is an interaction with the environment.

00:27:14:21 - 00:27:53:00

Unknown

And the environment is basically anything external to this quantum object, that interaction causes superpositions to collapse very quickly and they collapse into one of, let's say, their interest two possibilities. Then you would get one of these two possibilities perfectly at random. And so if you now try to build a quantum computer out of qubits and each of these qubits collapsing at random because of interactions with the environment into one of its two states, zero or one, it's no longer zero and one, but it's random, then basically what you're going to get is a computer that spits out random answers, which typically is pretty useless.

00:27:53:02 - 00:28:19:08

Unknown

And so to prevent that from happening, we have work very hard on two separate problems. One is just to engineer the heck out of it and make it as isolated as possible. But a computer that is from the environment so that it is it's perfectly, in fact humans shielded from electromagnetic radiation and so on and so on. And at the same time, we still need to access this computer, right?

00:28:19:08 - 00:28:43:10

Unknown

I mean, we still need to input information, let it to do its thing and then output information and read the information. So fact that we have to input and read out means that we have to open this, this, this shield that we built around our quantum computer. And by the way, we also to control it while it's executing tasks, we have to send in, you know, programing instructions essentially.

00:28:43:12 - 00:29:18:05

Unknown

So at every level, we we we're trying to do two things that are contradictory. We're trying to both completely isolate the quantum computer from its environment to prevent superpositions from collapsing. And we're also trying to interact with this device. And and, you know, those two contradictory conditions create this conflict, which makes very hard to build quantum computers. But fortunately and this is really where U.S. has been at the forefront since the very beginning, we have ways of dealing with this problem, and that is known as quantum error correction.

00:29:18:07 - 00:29:48:09

Unknown

And so quantum error correction is the idea that we can try to be clever and do stuff which we can get into that despite the these contradictory requirements that I just described. Despite this, we can still input, control and output information reliably by correcting errors that in the error is the collapse of the superposition, correcting errors either while they're occurring or after they have already occurred.

00:29:48:09 - 00:30:13:17

Unknown

Or maybe we don't even need to fully correct these errors. Maybe we can just suppress the errors and prevent them from rearing their ugly head before before it's too late. And how far along are we in overcoming this challenge? Rosa, you don't think that we're all I mean, again, at USC, we have a lot of expertise in this.

00:30:13:19 - 00:31:00:16

Unknown

And so there is progress. I cannot quantify how far along we are, but definitely there are steps that I mean, in imply sophisticated, sophisticated treatment of the quantum states to to do that at the software level. At the same time, there are efforts at the hardware level to improve that ecology. Now, it's not only at USC and we just saw the announcement by Microsoft of their topological chip, and that's something that is supposed to realize that implicitly.

00:31:00:16 - 00:31:36:10

Unknown

Quantum error correction. Now, I haven't looked at the details of the article and I don't know which level these is realized in this first quantum chip, but I think it's only a prototype conceptual prototype. But that doesn't really do that. But I mean, there is a critical mass of people working in that direction that in both physics, engineering and computer science, I would say in the last ten years, the progress has been gigantic.

00:31:36:13 - 00:32:08:04

Unknown

So I'm hopeful that in the next 5 to 10 years, I would say, well, we'll have logical quantum computer that can solve that old maxim. It's clear. So it's clear that there's big efforts going on across, both industry and many universities, including USC, to to tackle these problems. Right. For example, to solve this fundamental or at least to mitigate this fundamental of of of error correction.

00:32:08:06 - 00:32:39:00

Unknown

But in the meantime, we're also seeing a lot of very clever teams, including you come up with some solutions to show utility for quantum computing with the current state of technology. And a question that I often get asked is earlier we talked about applications of quantum computing to simulating quantum systems. A question that I often get asked is application of quantum computing to the life sciences, to the health sciences, to people's lives, literally to people, to people's bodies.

00:32:39:02 - 00:33:03:17

Unknown

I wanted to ask both of you about your efforts in this area, because, Daniel, I know you've been involved in the application of quantum computing in the wake of COVID 19 disease. And Rosa, I know that you and Daniel and the chair of our Quantitative and Computational Biology Department, Rima Rose, were one of the first teams to basically put together a demonstration of quantum computing for simulating a biological problem.

00:33:03:21 - 00:33:20:18

Unknown

So I want to hear I think this will be very interesting for our audience. So I want to hear from both of you about your efforts in this area. Danielle, maybe let's start with you about the COVID story. Yeah, that's right. So in the in early days of COVID, I felt like I wanted to do something other than just staying home.

00:33:20:20 - 00:33:57:21

Unknown

And it happened that I had a collaborator who was a, well, a real doctor working on an infectious diseases, and he was able to get data from a French hospital where there were patients who were being classified into either having a severe reaction to COVID or moderate reaction COVID or no reaction to COVID at all. And using that data, we built a machine learning model that was trying to identify what the genetic underlying cause was for this severe versus moderate versus no reaction.

00:33:57:21 - 00:34:33:09

Unknown

And is there is G is there a gene that's responsible for severe respiratory reaction due to COVID? And we were able to do that using both classical machine learning models and a quantum machine learning model that we built and the quantum machine learning model, we ran it on the D-Wave Machine that we have here at USC. And a combination of these classical and quantum machine learning models that were basically playing off against each other, reinforcing each other, checking each other's answers, was able to actually find the gene.

00:34:33:11 - 00:35:00:07

Unknown

This was in the early days and of course the virus has mutated many times since. But nevertheless, a particular gene was identified and I left the project. But I know that our collaborators then went on and pursued designing a pharmaceutical treatment that would be based on this gene discovery. And Rosa, I wanted to also ask you about your efforts and simulations of biological problems using quantum computers.

00:35:00:09 - 00:35:37:02

Unknown

Yeah, Thank you, Mark. So I'm starting slowly to work on drug design. That and that. Sorry that Daniel mentioned earlier. And again, this is a quantum problem now because in in drug design, we'll look at the formation of complexes between small molecules that are the drugs or ligands and proteins that carry some functions in the cell. And these functions are imbalanced and then the disease arises.

00:35:37:04 - 00:36:09:07

Unknown

So there is a reorganization of the atoms and the associated electrons that when these complex is formed, that with respect to the isolated components and this is an an issue of characterizing the binding energy and finding the most favorable complex and how it is formed, that can give us a tool to develop our industrial process to produce the drug.

00:36:09:09 - 00:36:47:14

Unknown

So I'm starting to target a cancer drug design where drugs can bind to either proteins or nucleic acids. And the idea is exactly that. So to characterize the energies and we need development that many different levels are at the classical level at creating a bridge between the quantum, the classical output and the quantum inputs, and then running on the quantum input with novel algorithms potentially more powerful than the ones that we are using now.

00:36:47:15 - 00:37:25:23

Unknown

And taking advantage of quantum error correction. If doable. There is another problem that really attracts my attention and I it's it's in my plans, which is DNA replication. So there is a hypothesis that DNA replication and that is a I mean involves electron transfer in nucleic acids and between proteins and nucleic acids, electrons are quantum particles, and we can only describe them with quantum physics.

00:37:26:00 - 00:38:15:22

Unknown

So the quantum systems that are at play in problem are uge on affordable on classical computers. So either we have quantum computers or we do not tackle the problem with an accuracy that we've challenged the mechanisms. So that that's really about discovering the mechanisms for DNA replication, which I find fascinating. There. Terrific. So I before we turn to some of the great questions that we're already getting from the audience and also some of the questions that we got beforehand from registrations, I want to pause here for a second to tell our audience that USC is now home to this quantum initiative that is part of the frontiers of computing effort that's going on in the

00:38:15:22 - 00:38:52:20

Unknown

whole university. And our initiative is designed to essentially tackle both the fundamental problems that will get quantum computing to make a difference in people's lives, like quantum error correction, develop new quantum technologies like quantum sensing, but also give our students access to quantum computers both as you see on your screen, the D-Wave system that is housed here at USC, at the Information Sciences Institute and cloud access to all of these quantum computers that IBM is hosted through our USC, IBM Quantum Innovation Center that Rosa and Daniel are the co-directors of.

00:38:52:22 - 00:39:20:06

Unknown

And at the same time, we're interested in having our students and our staff, faculty and postdocs and Ph.D. students work on leveraging these quantum systems to do all these kinds of simulations that we've been talking about for problems that range from energy, material discovery, and and drug discovery. So USC is really, really well positioned for these advances that are happening in the quantum computing and generally the quantum information science world.

00:39:20:08 - 00:39:41:08

Unknown

All right. So I would like to turn my attention to some of the questions that we've gotten either from registrations beforehand or right now coming in from the audience. And I'd like to start with a very general question that arrived about whether we see that the biggest challenges in quantum computing require more practical experimentation or more theory development.

00:39:41:08 - 00:39:42:04

Unknown

Daniel

00:39:42:04 - 00:40:10:20

Unknown

Well, it's it's both. Of course, we need advances on both the practical side, experimentation side and the theory side. They go hand in hand, they feed off of each other. And I would say that the most significant efforts happening currently at, let's say, the leading commercial labs like like Google and IBM and others have large teams of both theoreticians and experimentalists.

00:40:10:20 - 00:40:39:10

Unknown

And of course, these teams are being fed from institutions like UC, as we discussed before. So it's both Yeah. And Sater in the can I add something? I mean, I mean the kind of theory that we need to go hand in hand with the experiment is not necessarily something that directly interprets the experiments or guides the experiments. It could be just more fundamental and predict transformative concept.

00:40:39:11 - 00:41:03:01

Unknown

So that may, you know, create that step that is really needed. So I there's that we also got a few variations of the same question, which is I think it's not only talking about college students, it's asking how would someone get involved? What should students study? How would they prepare, or what if they're interested in a field like this?

00:41:03:01 - 00:41:31:05

Unknown

Yeah, if you have a good background in math or in physics or in computer science or in chemistry, I would say any one of these or an engineer, any one of these is is an excellent entry point. Contributing his or information. Science is very broad. We accept students into our masters and PhD programs with all of the above type backgrounds.

00:41:31:07 - 00:41:47:13

Unknown

And I mean just one of the categories that I listed you don't have to be an expert in and everything. And then we bring everybody up to speed. So there's that many different entry points and you don't have to be a super specialist in quantum computing in order to get started as a researcher.

00:41:47:13 - 00:41:57:06

Unknown

I also want to mention sorry, the the need or plus for interdisciplinary research.

00:41:57:06 - 00:42:32:04

Unknown

I saw a person, a student, a researcher who has a I mean different face outside, different expertise is also something that is promising towards progress. Terrific. We got a question asking us to say something to our audience about news that made a big splash this week from Microsoft reporting what appears to be a significant development in topological quantum computing.

00:42:32:06 - 00:42:59:07

Unknown

Daniel, can you narrate that a little bit for our audience? Help maybe explain the background for that and why that may be another big promising technology for quantum computing? Yeah. So we talked about quantum error correction before and the fragility of of qubits and so on. And for a couple of decades now, this beautiful idea has been guiding theory and experiment that's related to topology.

00:42:59:09 - 00:43:19:12

Unknown

And we're not going to get into topology right now in any depth, but basically the idea is that you can, you can build qubits that are very, very robust. It's really hard to break them. And it's the topological feature that they exhibit, which which makes them so hard to break. And when I say break, I mean the environment can't break them.

00:43:19:12 - 00:43:49:03

Unknown

It can't break the superposition. So Microsoft is one of the leading research labs where people have been trying to build a super robust, so called topological qubits. They've been doing that for for more than a decade now. And the paper that they published in Nature just a few days ago is a progress report on being able to measure these topological qubits if somebody actually were to make them.

00:43:49:05 - 00:44:11:16

Unknown

And so essentially they presented a device that could tell you this a topological qubit. It's called a majorana zero mode is the technical term. It's a piece of wire with, in essence, two halves of an electron on either end. So it's a it's an exotic thing, right? I mean, breaking up an electron into and into two micron to to have, so to speak.

00:44:11:18 - 00:44:46:17

Unknown

So you can see that this is very advanced technology. They didn't actually report the discovery of the Majorana zero mode itself. They didn't discover the report on a topological qubit as such, but they reported on a device that would be able to measure them if they actually existed. We didn't talk too much about the implications of quantum computing for cryptography in this conversation, but we got a really wonderful question from one of our audience member, Charles.

00:44:46:19 - 00:45:00:00

Unknown

So Charles is asking, once quantum computers are more accessible to the general public with existing cryptography methods become ineffective or even obsolete with the entire field of cryptography, you need to restructure.

00:45:00:00 - 00:45:09:22

Unknown

need to take it or else if you prefer you once. But you're you're more the experts in this field. So it's a I mean it is already happening now.

00:45:09:22 - 00:45:37:01

Unknown

So there is something that is called the post quantum cryptography, which is already a very lively research field in computer science. And we have international connections also to do that. So post quantum cryptography is realizing some classical methods that can give you that quantum breaking back.

00:45:37:01 - 00:45:40:09

Unknown

That's what I understand. Daniel maybe you can add something.

00:45:40:09 - 00:45:44:03

Unknown

Yeah. No, I think you you nailed the kind of the end of the story.

00:45:44:05 - 00:46:10:18

Unknown

So when Shaw discovered his, his algorithm, the reason that there was so much excitement about computing that right after that, because people immediately realized that, wow, public key encryption is no longer safe. And well, let's actually let's let's pause on that for a second. Daniel, could you explain to people what was the connection of the Shaw algorithm to cryptography, meaning the importance of prime numbers?

00:46:10:18 - 00:46:37:13

Unknown

How are people's information actually when they're using everyday computers are encrypted? Maybe that will set the stage for explaining why then this became a serious conversation. Yeah, there is an algorithm that is called RSA A and the A, as is Len Adelman, who was a faculty member here at USC. And that algorithm has basically powered the encryption methods that we use for commercial transactions online.

00:46:37:13 - 00:47:06:02

Unknown

And also various government agencies use it to encrypt their their data. And so on that the RSA algorithm has really been the foundational building block of encryption methods for for decades now. And it's based on a simple mathematical fact, which is that it's really hard to find the prime factors of a large number. And so if you wanted to factor a small number like 15, you could instantly say, 15 is five times three.

00:47:06:02 - 00:47:26:12

Unknown

Those are the two prime factors of 15. But if somebody gave you a number that was 15 digits long or, 2000 digits long, it becomes exponentially hard essentially to to solve this problem on a classical computer. As far as we know, by the way, we don't know for sure that it's actually hard to factor large integers on a classical computer.

00:47:26:14 - 00:47:53:08

Unknown

But public knowledge about this is that it's a very, very hard task. And then along comes Shaw in 95 or 94 and promote the events this this quantum algorithm for factoring which would crack this problem in much much less time and so-called polynomial time. And that meant that all these encryption methods based on RSA would immediately longer become secure.

00:47:53:10 - 00:48:21:02

Unknown

And it set the stage for this race to build on computers. And then now fast forward to what Rosen was just talking about. Security agencies around the world realized that maybe we need to replace RSA with methods that are robust against these quantum attacks is called post quantum encryption. And so quant computing has already had enormous impact in this sense, even without anybody having ever built a quantum computer.

00:48:21:02 - 00:48:49:12

Unknown

The very notion that such a quantum computer might arise one day or maybe already exists in some obscure basement and nobody, nobody about it outside of the particular agency that built it, that has set off this this race to replace existing encryption methods with post quantum cryptography. And every encryption system that we have currently is eventually going to have to be replaced at great cost, by the way.

00:48:49:14 - 00:49:17:05

Unknown

So there's already been this impact of quantum computing. So that's another way that it may affect people's lives very soon. Right. And in the cryptography area, Rosa, we got a question from another one of our audience members. To me, too, is asking a very interesting question, maybe relevant to your work in simulations, which is about how do you verify the solution, How do you verify a quantum solution or the outcome of a computation on a quantum computing?

00:49:17:11 - 00:49:52:07

Unknown

How do we know that the answer is correct? That that's a really fascinating and excellent question. Yeah, that actually I noted that question and I wanted to answer this, so thanks for pointing it to. So we build benchmarks, at least in what I do in applications of quantum computing. So we've built the benchmarks on the systems that are affordable computationally both on classical computers and quantum computers.

00:49:52:09 - 00:50:41:11

Unknown

So we test the algorithm. Then you want to learn to read them on the classical data for the system so that we can study classically. And then we project the validity of the algorithm to systems that we cannot treat classically but have the same chemical nature. So We can expect that they behave similarly. And there is a big one quantum benchmarking program that has been run the agency in the last three years, and they will continue and USC has been part of it with the large DMA in collaboration with other universities.

00:50:41:13 - 00:51:22:18

Unknown

And I mean, it's in and not interesting that you will see in was the only academic team in this program. So all the others were mostly heavily company oriented with some academies in the partnership, but USC was mostly academic. So we learned a lot from that. But definitely a been benchmarking are needed. And we also I mean, we take inspiration from from for these benchmarking tests, from classical benchmarking initiatives that are already assessed.

00:51:22:18 - 00:51:48:19

Unknown

We we got an interesting question that reflects how, you know, what comes into people's minds as they think about quantum computing is probably another that is happening very quickly right now, which is the fast rise of artificial intelligence and machine learning. So we have a very interesting question from Jose from Otto, from our audience, asking, do you foresee advancements in A.I. going hand in hand with quantum computing research and accelerating the field?

00:51:48:19 - 00:52:07:01

Unknown

Daniel You already actually said something interesting earlier about your own development of quantum machine learning algorithms. So there's already kind of a hint for our audience about a connection that is emerging right now between quantum computing on one hand, and machine learning and general artificial intelligence on the other. Could you tell us a little bit about how you see this playing out in the future?

00:52:07:01 - 00:52:34:05

Unknown

Yeah. So quantum machine learning is one of those areas that people are working on very hard and and there is some promise there as well. It's not just quantum simulation, which we discussed in detail. There are strong indications that we might get a quantum advantage in quantum machine learning. That is the ability to perform computations that are faster than than with traditional classical and machine learning.

00:52:34:07 - 00:53:01:11

Unknown

And I'd say there's there's a kind of a two way street here between traditional AI and quantum computing and quantum machine learning. So on the one hand, we researchers in this area of quantum information have, of course, picked up the amazing tools that are now available through the likes of Openai and in other companies that are making these large language models.

00:53:01:13 - 00:53:26:02

Unknown

You know, these these have become ubiquitous research tools and they help us solve our research problems. And we're not unique in that sense. Where where there is something interesting that specifically about quantum computing in this area is that probably everybody has heard about the fact that the world of of AI is running out of data to train on.

00:53:26:03 - 00:53:53:12

Unknown

So Where are they going to get new data? Well, I mean, there are also four ideas out there. But one of the rich sources of untapped data is the quantum world itself. So you can imagine quantum computers generating an enormous amount of new data that would be inaccessible through ordinary classical computing because, well, we need quantum computers to generate this data, and this could be genuine quantum data.

00:53:53:12 - 00:54:23:19

Unknown

So superposition states essentially entangled states, or it could be data that is classical data, but comes from solving these problems that only quantum computers can can ultimately solve. So I think there's a very interesting direction here to be pursued. Where quantum computers are will become the new data forms for classical A.I. and will will generate all this new fascinating data that they could train on.

00:54:23:21 - 00:55:02:03

Unknown

Yes, please go ahead. ROSEN On something just to connect to what we have already said, I mean, in the problem of computational drug discovery, for instance, there could be interplay between the quantum computation of energies and the screening of molecules of drugs by artificially intelligence, even classical artificial intelligence. So again, interplay between classical and quantum. And there's a team at USC who is collaborating with the Keck Medical School on image recognition with quantum algorithms, quantum machine learning algorithms.

00:55:02:05 - 00:55:22:00

Unknown

And I mean, I saw the results on tumors. They're pretty amazing, right? We so we are getting close, close to the hour mark here. And I wanted to just have you both reflect for me for a little bit on where do you think this is headed in the short term, let's say, in the next 5 to 10 years?

00:55:22:02 - 00:55:35:23

Unknown

What do you think the big advances will be? Will there be winning? Qubit technologies will be specific applications that perhaps make an impact on people's lives before others? What sort of what excites you about the next few years

00:55:35:23 - 00:55:46:00

Unknown

this fall? So as I read all of these so, I mean, I'm excited by applications, but I'm also excited more by science.

00:55:46:00 - 00:56:12:10

Unknown

And so I'm hoping to see some transformative steps that will give us the ultimate computational technology. And I'm also looking forward to see our I mean, young researchers mature and become the creative minds to suggest new stuff. So

00:56:12:10 - 00:56:28:05

Unknown

ideal. I'll leave you with the last word. Yeah. So I think that we're going to come full circle and that, you know, Feynman's original vision of quantum simulation being done by quantum computers is going to happen.

00:56:28:10 - 00:56:58:13

Unknown

And that is where this this field is clearly headed. And we're going to. What I'm excited about is, you know, having been involved in this field for I can't believe I'm saying this, but almost 30 years myself, I think that we're within my lifetime and hopefully I live another five years or ten years to see this. We're going to see quantum simulation actually becoming a reality, discovering new things that we're not able to to see with ordinary classical computing technology.

00:56:58:13 - 00:57:24:00

Unknown

We're going to discover new materials, we're going to discover new pharmaceuticals, we're going to discover new phases of matter. Maybe we'll solve problems in astronomy and cosmology and particle physics using quantum computers. I think that's where we're going to see the most dramatic immediate impact in the near future. And once that happens, once we have these actual new discoveries using car and computers, it's going to transform computing as we know it.

00:57:24:03 - 00:57:52:10

Unknown

Wonderful. Thank you. So we are at the hour, Mark, so it's time to wrap up. I'd like to end as started by thanking both Professor Danielle Leader and Professor Rose of the Village for participating today. If you're interested in learning more about the USC Dornsife and the Better School of Engineering efforts as part of the Quantum Initiative of USC, please visit Quantum that USC that EDU that describes a lot of the activity that we described to you today.

00:57:52:10 - 00:58:00:07

Unknown

Or go to Dornsife at USC that you for a more in-depth story. Thank you all and see you next time in the Dornsife dialogs dialogs.

00:58:00:07 - 00:58:08:06

Unknown

We hope you enjoyed this episode of the Dornsife Dialogs Podcast. Please leave us a rating and a review wherever you listen.

00:58:08:08 - 00:58:11:11

Unknown

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