This award is for a workshop "Enabling Quantum Leap: Quantum algorithms for quantum chemistry and materials" to be held on January 22-24, 2019 in Alexandria, Virginia. The workshop is co-sponsored by the Divisions of Chemistry, Materials Research and Physics in MPS and the Division of Computing and Communication Foundations in CISE. The workshop, organized by Garnet Chan (California Institute of Technology), Bela Bauer (Microsoft Research) and Sergey Bravyi (IBM T.J. Watson Research Center) brings together a diverse and highly interdisciplinary group of experts to advance the science, collaboration, education, and broader impacts of quantum computing as applied to the quantum simulation of physical systems. One of the earliest and most compelling applications for quantum computers is Richard Feynman's idea of simulating quantum systems. Such systems, often with many degrees of freedom, can be difficult to simulate accurately and efficiently on ordinary computers, even supercomputers. This workshop has a focus on applications of quantum computers to problems in chemistry and materials science.
By its nature, quantum simulation is an interdisciplinary science. Scientific progress requires domain expertise in chemistry, materials science, physics, quantum algorithms, as well as computer science. Also, given the broad societal impact, stakeholders not only include educators, but also federal agencies, and industry partners.
The specific goals of the workshop are to: 1. Identify central problems in chemistry and materials science, in the areas of electronic structure, quantum statistical mechanics, and quantum dynamics, as target problems for quantum computers; 2. Identify areas for new quantum algorithms and critical aspects of current quantum algorithms to improve for applications to the above problems. This includes understanding the complexity of physical problems for quantum simulation, new and improved algorithms for near-term hardware,including non-general purpose hardware such as quantum annealers and quantum simulators, and ways to bridge classical simulation algorithms with quantum algorithms; 3. Bring together active and interested workers in the fields of quantum chemistry, quantum materials science, and quantum algorithms; 4. Explore how to educate a new generation of scientists who are trained both in the application areas of quantum simulation as well as in quantum algorithms; 5. Propose concrete mechanisms that help advance the field and achieve convergence in efforts from different disciplines; 6. Interface academic and industry efforts in theoretical algorithms, software, and hardware, for chemistry and materials simulations; 7. Prepare a workshop report for the community on how to advance the field.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
