Book Image

Dancing with Qubits

By : Robert S. Sutor
5 (1)
Book Image

Dancing with Qubits

5 (1)
By: Robert S. Sutor

Overview of this book

Quantum computing is making us change the way we think about computers. Quantum bits, a.k.a. qubits, can make it possible to solve problems that would otherwise be intractable with current computing technology. Dancing with Qubits is a quantum computing textbook that starts with an overview of why quantum computing is so different from classical computing and describes several industry use cases where it can have a major impact. From there it moves on to a fuller description of classical computing and the mathematical underpinnings necessary to understand such concepts as superposition, entanglement, and interference. Next up is circuits and algorithms, both basic and more sophisticated. It then nicely moves on to provide a survey of the physics and engineering ideas behind how quantum computing hardware is built. Finally, the book looks to the future and gives you guidance on understanding how further developments will affect you. Really understanding quantum computing requires a lot of math, and this book doesn't shy away from the necessary math concepts you'll need. Each topic is introduced and explained thoroughly, in clear English with helpful examples.
Table of Contents (16 chapters)
Preface
13
Afterword

9.1 So many gates …

In practice, a hardware quantum computer implements a core set of primitive gates and the others are built from them using circuits. These core operations may be among the ones we saw in the last chapter or they may be much stranger looking: any 2 by 2 unitary matrix can be considered a 1-qubit gate.

The primitive gates depend on the technology used to create the physical quantum computer. More advanced gates are then built from these primitive gates. The Qiskit open source quantum computing framework, for example, provides a large selection of gates you can use, many of them built from the core ones. [16]

At the hardware level, experimental physicists and engineers work to optimize the core gates. Above that, other physicists and computer scientists try to create the best performing higher-level gates.

In the classical case, machine code is extremely low level and directly instructs the processor. Above that is assembly code, which abstracts...