IBM is Rolling out the World's First Universal 'Quantum Computing' Service

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We're all excited about the potential of quantum computers - devices that will harness strange quantum phenomena to perform calculations far more powerful than anything conventional computers can do today.

Unfortunately, we still don't have a tangible, large-scale quantum computer to freak out over just yet, but IBM is already preparing for a future when we do, by announcing that they're rolling out a universal 'quantum-computing' service later this year.

The service will be called IBM Q, and it will give people access to their early-stage quantum computer over the internet to use as they wish - for a fee.

The big elephant in the room is that, for now, IBM's quantum computer only runs on five qubits, so it's not much faster (if any faster) than a conventional computer.

But their technology is improving all the time. The company has announced it hopes to get to 50 qubits in the next few years, and in the meantime, it's building the online systems and software so that anyone in the world can access the full power of its quantum computer when it's ready. IBM Q is a crucial part of that.

QuantumComputing. The three types of quantum computing. Credit: ExtremeTech

Unlike conventional computers, which use 'bits' of either 1 or 0 to code information, quantum computers use a strange phenomenon known as superposition, which allows an atom to be in both the 1 and 0 position at the same time. These quantum bits, or qubits, give quantum computers far more processing power than traditional computers.

But right now, qubits are hard to make and manipulate, even for more the most high-tech labs. Which is why IBM only has five qubits working together in a computer, despite decades of research. And those qubits have to be cooled to temperatures just above absolute zero in order to function.

Companies such as Google, and multiple university research labs, have also built primitive quantum computers, and Google has even used theirs to simulate a molecule for the first time, showing the potential of this technology as it scales up.

But instead of just focussing on the hardware itself, IBM is also interested in the software around quantum computers, and how to give the public access to them.

"IBM has invested over decades to growing the field of quantum computing and we are committed to expanding access to quantum systems and their powerful capabilities for the science and business communities," said Arvind Krishna, senior vice president of Hybrid Cloud and director for IBM Research.

IBM Q universal quantum computer Credit: YouTube

The system builds on the company's Quantum Experience, which was rolled out last year for free to approved researchers. IBM Q will use similar cloud software, but will also be open to businesses - and, more importantly, any programmers and developers who want to start experimenting with writing code for quantum systems.

The goal is to have a functional, commercial, cloud-based service ready to go when a fully realised quantum computer does come online.

"Putting the machine on the cloud is an obvious thing to do," physicist Christopher Monroe from the University of Maryland, who isn't involved with IBM, told Davide Castelvecchi over at Scientific American. "But it takes a lot of work in getting a system to that level."

The challenge is that while, on paper, a five-qubit machine is pretty easy to simulate and program for, real qubits don't quite work that way, because you're working with atoms that can change their behaviour based on environmental conditions

"The real challenge is whether you can make your algorithm work on real hardware that has imperfections," Isaac Chuang, a physicist at MIT who doesn't work with IBM, told Scientific American.

In their announcement, IBM said that in the past few months, more than 40,000 users have already used Quantum Experience to build and run 275,000 test applications, and 15 research papers have been published based off of it so far.

And they predict that in future, the quantum service will become even more useful.

"Quantum computers will deliver solutions to important problems where patterns cannot be seen because the data doesn't exist and the possibilities that you need to explore to get to the answer are too enormous to ever be processed by classical computers," said IBM in its announcement.

There's no word as yet on how much IBM Q will cost to use, or how users will be approved. But we have to admit it'd be pretty cool to be among the first to play around with quantum computing.



Other articles on the same theme:

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• The new supercomputer “Minerva” has been put into operation at the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics (Albert Einstein Institute, AEI).

• IBM developed the first artificial neurons

• New Particle zoo in a quantum computer First experimental quantum simulation of particle physics phenomena

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The above post is reprinted from materials provided by Sciencealert . Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

Australian Radio Telescope Parkes Joins $100 Million Search for Alien Life

The Parkes radio telescope in Australia is the third telescope to begin searching for signs of intelligent alien life as part of the $100 million Breakthrough Listen project. Credit: CSIRO

Updated today 20/05/2020

$100 million search for intelligent alien life just added a big arrow to its quiver.

Breakthrough Listen has begun using the Parkes radio telescope in Australia to scan the heavens, representatives of the ambitious, decade-long project announced Monday (Nov.7).

Parkes, Narrabri radio telescopes to be upgraded to improve Space Connect

The Parkes dish becomes the third telescope to be employed by Breakthrough Listen, joining the Green Bank Telescope in West Virginia and the Automated Planet Finder at Lick Observatory in Northern California


"The addition of Parkes is an important milestone," billionaire entrepreneur Yuri Milner, founder of the Breakthrough Initiatives, which include Breakthrough Listen, said in a statement. "These major instruments are the ears of planet Earth, and now they are listening for signs of other civilizations."

The Parkes radio telescope can tilt 60° from vertical and would take 15 minutes to perform a 360° rotation. photo: wikipedia.org

The first Breakthrough Listen observations for the Parkes dish came Monday, when scientists turned the telescope toward the Proxima Centauri star system to look for possible signals from alien civilizations.

Proxima Centauri is the closest star to the sun, lying just 4.2 light-years away from Earth's star. This past August, astronomers announced the discovery of an Earth-size planet orbiting in Proxima Centauri's "habitable zone," the just-right range of distances where liquid water could exist on a world's surface.

It's therefore possible that the planet, known as Proxima b, may be capable of supporting life as we know it, scientists have said.

"The chances of any particular planet hosting intelligent life-forms are probably minuscule," Andrew Siemion, director of the University of California, Berkeley's SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Research Center, said in the same statement.

"But once we knew there was a planet right next door, we had to ask the question, and it was a fitting first observation for Parkes," Siemion added. "To find a civilization just 4.2 light-years away would change everything."

Proxima Centauri is also the target of Breakthrough Starshot, a Breakthrough Initiatives effort that aims to blast tiny, sail-equipped "nanoprobes" toward the system at 20 percent the speed of light using powerful lasers. Milner and a group of researchers, including famed cosmologist Stephen Hawking, announced Breakthrough Listen in July 2015. Over the next 10 years, the $100 million endeavor aims to search the 1 million stars closest to the sun, as well as the 100 nearest galaxies to the Milky Way, for possible SETI signals.

The 210-foot-wide (64 meters) Parkes dish, which is operated by Australia's Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), lies near the town of Parkes, in the state of New South Wales. The radio telescope famously helped relay live video of the Apollo 11 moon landing back to Earth in July 1969, a role featured in the 2000 film "The Dish."

Breakthrough Listen representatives also announced last month that the project would be teaming up with China's new Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST) — the world's largest radio telescope — to coordinate SETI observations.


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• It was created the most complex map of the Milky Way . It shows that our galaxy is much more extensive than previously thought

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The above post is reprinted from materials provided by Space . Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

Space-time crystals may exist in reality. It is possible that Nobel Laureate in Physics 2012 have been right

If there were, these objects might be held indefinitely movements.

The crystals are structures hypothetical space-time performing movements though are in a state in which the lowest energy. This ability does not match the translational symmetry of time, but the researchers showed that it could prove the existence of natural elements first proposed in 2012 by Nobel Prize winner for physics, Frank Wilczek.

Four years ago, Wilczek and his research team at MIT suggest that it is possible that a crystal should be added a fourth dimension, time movement to make him behave like a clock. In other words, experts forecast creating an object that can conduct perpetual movements and moving each time returning to its state of minimum energy. Experts say so far that movement of an object in this state is impossible, but the Nobel laureate says this does not apply in the case of space-time crystals.

Physicists at the University of California claim that it is possible in theory to manufacture space-time crystals of a system of atoms, ions or superconducting qubits, quantum computers particles used in the construction. Researchers have tried, in fact, to find a way to produce crystal spacetime, but strove to demonstrate that they do not correspond to translational symmetry of time.

Translational symmetry of time is a version of the space-time symmetry, showing that the laws of physics are valid regardless of space or time. Specialists at the University of California claim, however, that the translational symmetry of time can be interrupted without causing side effects.

Using a simulation experts demonstrated how translational symmetry of time can be interrupted spontaneously in a type of quantum system known as ,, Floquet-many-body systems-driven localised. "Researchers have discovered that a crystal it can usually be turned into such a system and showed that it can exist without violating the laws of physics.

Through their study, the researchers showed that the temperature does not rise never studied object, even if it carries out periodic oscillations. Moreover, on the way that the system size grew continuously during reentry object required in the state of translational symmetry fall, which means that in an infinite system, this condition can not be achieved again.

Therefore, the translational symmetry of time can be neglected in the case of a space-time crystal as the temperature of the object that carries perpetual oscillations does not increase again. For this reason, the second law of thermodynamics is respected, and the crystal exists under the laws of physics.

,, Our work is doubly important. First, it demonstrates that translational symmetry of time can be broken spontaneously. On the other hand, it makes us understand better that the systems are not in thermodynamic equilibrium can exist in states that materials of this type can experience, "says Bela Bauer, one of the research team members from University of California.


Source: sciencealert.com