So much has been happening on the quantum technology front in recent days that it would be unwise to try to cram it all into one wrap-up story… but we’re going to try anyway:
…The global quantum computing market was worth $490 million last year, and is expected to expand 21.9% annually through 2024, according to a new study from Hyperion Research that was sponsored by the Quantum Economic Development Consortium (QED-C) and QC Ware, with assistance from the European Quantum Industry Consortium and Quantum Industry Canada. The report also notes that software, middleware and applications are growing to account for a bigger share of the market value than hardware. We’ll see what happens after 2024, but in the few years that follow several companies are expecting to be able to demonstrate quantum advantage–the ability for a quantum computer to process a real-world problem faster than a classical computer…
…Want to live forever? Polaris Quantum Biotech and Allosteric Biosciences are working on that. Well, not exactly, but the companies have partnered (with Allosteric also taking an equity stake in Polaris) to integrate quantum computing and artificial intelligence and biosciences to study and discover new proteins and related inhibitors that could improve health and longevity against aging-related conditions…
…A report in New Scientist brought out the quantum boo-birds recently, as it highlighted University of Sussex research that suggested quantum computers could be used to crack bitcoin. This is not a trivial concern, but it should be noted that quantum computers are not nearly powerful enough to do so yet, and in a practical sense this may never be possible. At the same time, so many parties are working on quantum-safe security efforts that the collective efforts of the public sector and private firms in quantum, security and finance, could evolve well ahead of this being a real problem to worry about. Bitcoin fans already have enough to worry about…
…Canada is getting its own IBM Quantum System One, which will be available for use by next year, according to a Reuters report. That makes Canada the fifth country so far to get a System One, after the U.S. Germany, Japan and South Korea, the last two of which also will go live next year…
…Researchers from the University of Pittsburgh have built their own modular, Lego-like 7-qubit quantum computer, and are already innovating with the concept of connected qubits…
…University of Chicago researchers have demonstrated a qubit’s ability to remain in a quantum state for more than five seconds. That may not sound like very long, but it’s many times longer than the milliseconds that qubits typically hold their quantum state for. The achievement could aid in improving coherence and the overall stability and resilience of quantum computers to take on bigger, more complex tasks…
…Amazon Web Services this week blogged how researchers in Poland are leveraging Amazon Braket, the company’s managed, cloud-based quantum computing service on their projects. The Quantin Research Group, which works on fundamental and applied aspects of quantum computing, is using the service to advance quantum error mitigation. The group “is developing computationally-efficient methods to study and mitigate the effects of noise and cross-talk during the measurement process in superconducting qubits,” the blog post stated. “Measurement noise is one of the principal sources of errors in the quantum devices available today, and improving the quality of measurements is vital to practical applications of quantum computers.” Meanwhile, another group from the Military University of Technology in Warsaw, is investigating the application of quantum computers to the cryptographic security of common ciphers…
Watch for our weekly Quantum Updates on future Fridays...