https://nmsu.zoom.us/j/93240111620

Thursday, April 29, 2021 4:00om-5:00pm 

"Lessons from Quantum Annealing for the NISQ Era"

As a general-purpose quantum optimization algorithm, quantum annealing was billed as a promising approach for early demonstrations of the broad utility of quantum computing. When the first commercial quantum annealing devices became available in 2011, there was palpable excitement that we were on the verge of demonstrating the first quantum advantage over classical computing. This has not materialized yet; instead the physical realization of the algorithm in quantum annealers has revealed many obstacles.  I will discuss how decoherence in various forms impedes a determination of the potential of the algorithm, and how strict benchmarking standards and improving classical algorithms have set a very high bar for the demonstration of a quantum advantage. Our experience with quantum annealers will hopefully be valuable in evaluating future quantum information processors in the Noisy-Intermediate Scale Quantum (NISQ) era.