Quantum Computing: Google and NASA collaborate to compete

In early 2019, Google’s 72-qubit quantum chip, Bristlecone will compete with NASA’s world ranked supercomputer, Pleiades. Google and NASA signed the Space Act Agreement on July 2018. The agreement invites NASA to analyze and compare results computed from Bristlecone with that of Pleiades in an attempt to establish quantum supremacy. Bristlecone’s successful demo will be a game-changing development in the history of Quantum Computing.

Can a quantum chip score over supercomputer? The classical supercomputers store data in binary bits while quantum computers use qubits in an undefined state between 1 and 0. It's probable that qubits could resolve complex mathematical calculations faster than supercomputers.

Google's Cloud API will connect Bristlecone with NASA’s Quantum Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (QuAIL). The two organizations will collaborate to map “a diverse array of optimization and sampling problems” to the Bristlecone’s gate-model quantum computing system. NASA “will compare results from the classical simulation of quantum circuits to results from Google hardware”. A positive outcome in favor of Bristlecone's quantum supremacy will transform the future of quantum computing.

The five-year term agreement gives QuAIL access to Google’s quantum processor and software until at least 2023. As a result, QuAIL will provide technical support including “mappings, improved circuit simulation techniques, more efficient compilations [and] results from circuit simulations”

Google intends to share its quantum computing software to the public. Cirq is Google’s open-source Software Development Kit (SDK) for creating quantum circuits. Soon, Google’s Bristlecone will be available in the cloud with Cirq as its interface. Currently, researchers worldwide are using quantum cloud services from D-Wave, IBM and Rigetti per MIT Technology Review article.

In June 2018, the US House of Representatives voted to accelerate the development of quantum computing. The bill, called the National Quantum Initiative Act, to establish the goals and priorities for a 10-year plan to accelerate the development of quantum information science and technology applications. The Act passed the Senate in December 2018 is expected to be signed by the President. This will put the research and adoption of Quantum Computing in its next gear.