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Quantum Computing is Getting Real: Architecture, PL, and OS Roles in Closing the Gap between Quantum Algorithms and Machines

Published:19 March 2018Publication History
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Abstract

Quantum computing is at an inflection point, where 50-qubit (quantum bit) machines have been built, 100-qubit machines are just around the corner, and even 1000-qubit machines are perhaps only a few years away. These machines have the potential to fundamentally change our concept of what is computable and demonstrate practical applications in areas such as quantum chemistry, optimization, and quantum simulation. Yet a significant resource gap remains between practical quantum algorithms and real machines. There is an urgent shortage of the necessary computer scientists to work on software and architectures to close this gap. I will outline several grand research challenges in closing this gap, including programming language design, software and hardware verification, defining and perforating abstraction boundaries, cross-layer optimization, managing parallelism and communication, mapping and scheduling computations, reducing control complexity, machine-specific optimizations, learning error patterns, and many more. I will also describe the resources and infrastructure available for starting research in quantum computing and for tackling these challenges.

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  1. Quantum Computing is Getting Real: Architecture, PL, and OS Roles in Closing the Gap between Quantum Algorithms and Machines

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    • Published in

      cover image ACM SIGPLAN Notices
      ACM SIGPLAN Notices  Volume 53, Issue 2
      ASPLOS '18
      February 2018
      809 pages
      ISSN:0362-1340
      EISSN:1558-1160
      DOI:10.1145/3296957
      Issue’s Table of Contents
      • cover image ACM Conferences
        ASPLOS '18: Proceedings of the Twenty-Third International Conference on Architectural Support for Programming Languages and Operating Systems
        March 2018
        827 pages
        ISBN:9781450349116
        DOI:10.1145/3173162

      Copyright © 2018 Owner/Author

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      Association for Computing Machinery

      New York, NY, United States

      Publication History

      • Published: 19 March 2018

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