Announcing the Microsoft Quantum Development Kit 

1 min read

Just a few months back, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella shared our vision of empowering the quantum revolution with bold investments towards a scalable end-to-end solution, revolutionary topological approach, and a global team. Today, we take the next step in this journey with the Microsoft Quantum Development Kit to help you get started with quantum development. The Microsoft Quantum Development Kit, preview available here, includes the following three key components: Fully integrated quantum-focused programming language Q# (Q-sharp): Designed ground up for quantum, Q# is the most approachable high-level programming language with a native type system for qubits, operators, and other abstractions. Read more

Microsoft announces quantum computing programming language 

2 min read

For more than a decade, a team of researchers, engineers and developers at Microsoft has been working on quantum computing, a new model of computing that promises exponential increases in processing power and could help scientists tackle questions previously considered unanswerable—on topics ranging from climate science and medical research, to the human genome and economics. Read more

Elucidating reaction mechanisms on quantum computers 

1 min read

    We show how a quantum computer can be employed to elucidate reaction mechanisms in complex chemical systems, using the open problem of biological nitrogen fixation in nitrogenase as an example. We discuss how quantum computers can augment classical-computer simulations for such problems, to significantly increase their accuracy and enable hitherto intractable simulations. Detailed Read more

APS Physical Review Letters selects Station Q paper 

1 min read

  We are pleased to announce that the American Physical Society (APS) journal, Physical Review Letters, has selected the Station Q paper, Transport Signatures of Quasiparticle Poisoning in a Majorana Island, as an Editors’ Suggestion. The paper details how, working with theorists in Copenhagen, we found a way to measure the quasiparticle poisoning rate of a Majorana Read more

Magic state distillation with low space overhead and optimal asymptotic input count 

<1 min read

  In our quest for topological quantum computing with Majorana zero modes, one missing piece is the efficient, high-quality creation of magic states to perform the π/8 (or “T” gate). Our new paper, Magic State Distillation with Low Space Overhead and Optimal Asymptotic Input Count, provides a family of solutions to this need, allowing for a wide range Read more

Solving the quantum many-body problem with artificial neural networks 

1 min read

  Working together, ETH Zurich and Microsoft QuArC researchers have provided the first application of machine-learning techniques to solve outstanding problems in quantum physics. The neural networks used in their study developed a genuine intuition of the bizarre behavior of quantum particles. For example, after the artificial intelligence is trained on the elementary rules of Read more

Design automation and design space exploration for quantum computers 

1 min read

  A major hurdle for quantum algorithms for linear systems of equations, and for quantum simulation algorithms, is the difficulty to find simple circuits for arithmetic. Prior approaches typically led to a large overhead in terms of quantum memory, required operations, or implementation error. By leveraging recent advances in reversible logic synthesis, Martin Roetteler and Read more

Common framework for scientific experiments: QCoDeS 

1 min read

  QCoDeS is an open source data acquisition framework that was created by distilling the homegrown solutions used in Station Q’s experimental labs, and infused with all the best practices from the open source software world. It includes a simple syntax to define complex sweeps over n-dimensional parameter space, all the machinery required to visualize Read more

Transport signatures of quasiparticle poisoning in a Majorana island 

1 min read

As its name implies, the poisoning of Majorana devices by normal electrons is fatal to topological computation, so much effort is now focused on characterizing the degree of poisoning either by the creation of quasiparticle pairs within the device, or by electrons entering the device through the leads. A recent experiment (see https://arxiv.org/abs/1612.05748), led by Sven Read more

A clear view of emerging and hybridizing Majorana zero modes using epitaxial InAs-Al nanowires 

1 min read

  The first signature of Majorana physics, identified experimentally at TU Delft in 2012, focused on a characteristic conductance peak at zero voltage. It bore many signatures of Majorana zero modes, but had a sizable background signal that obscured how the peak arose out of coalescing Andreev bound states. Recently, Mingtang Deng and a Station Read more