Who is hosting this competition?
This competition originated out of the Whitfield Lab at Dartmouth College.
What is the state of quantum computing today?
Now, companies and research groups across America, China, Australia and Europe have several quantum devices readily available via cloud access. Academic and industrial group are creating new quantum algorithms for electronic structure and quantum simulation more broadly. These disparate entities are separated by corporate protections, national interest, and attribution concerns. The project being proposed will attempt to address this lack of unification through community engagement.
Why do we need quantum benchmarking?
As commercial quantum computing proceeds, there are many end-to-end studies of quantum algorithms and benchmarks for specific devices. However, what remains is standard and systematic simulation of molecules that can be compared to standard results. The proposed contest will solve this problem by using the same standardized benchmarking and testing data used for conventional computational chemistry methods (e.g. DFT).
What is the broader impact of this conference?
This conference brings together communities and sharpens the questions of where quantum computing is heading. This serves both the quantum community as well as scientists and engineers in other fields. This contest will track year to year progress allowing the trajectory to be extrapolated. Moreover, progress on the chosen area of electronic structure advances interests in drug discovery, material science, and other fields of science.
