D-Wave Two: the world’s second commercial quantum computer

A superfast computer that apparently uses quantum physical effects to perform tasks 3,600 times faster than standard computers is to be shared by Google, NASA and the non-profit Universities Space Research Association (USRA).  This is the world’s second commercial quantum computer to be made.  Parliamentary Yearbook reports.

A superfast D-Wave computer that operates 3,600 times faster than standard computers and is worth $15 million is to be shared by NASA, Google and the non-profit Universities Space Research Association.  The D-Wave Two computer has been built by the Canadian company D-Wave Systems. It is called a “quantum computer” because it relies on quantum bits (or qubits) which have properties that allow the computer to simultaneously perform multiple calculations to boost its speed.

Standard computers operate on a design created by the Englishman Alan Turing during the 1930s. 

They are digital and use bits as their measure of information. The term bit is a contraction of the term binary unit. The binary unit has two values or logical states: inactive or active. At any time a bit is therefore set to be in an “off state” or “on state”.
A quantum bit or qubit works very differently from a classical bit.  Unlike the bit, the qubit can be off, on or in a ‘superposition’ of both; which means that it exists in all theoretically possible states simultaneously (off and on and any state possible by superposition of these basis states). Quantum computation with a qubit processor exploits this quantum reality performing single tasks at speeds much greater than normal computers and multiple tasks more efficiently.

There is clearly a difficulty for ordinary intelligibility in claiming that an element which is susceptible of contrary values, for example being on or being off, can take both values simultaneously, as this seems to involve a contradiction. How can the given element be both on and off at the same time? This is “unintelligible”. It is worth remembering in this regard that physical theory since Newton in the seventeenth century has relied crucially on claimed “action at a distance”, for example in gravitational attraction, in defiance of the contact mechanics of ordinary common sense. Modern physics is therefore not intelligible to common sense in the way that earlier physics – which supposes mechanical causal influence to depend upon contact – is intelligible. It “works” – allowing detailed prediction - but there is a philosophical sense in which this success in prediction is not understood. However, plain contradiction – as apparently with quantum mechanical theory - might seem a step too far. Interested readers are invited to explore the term ‘quantum superposition’ by Google or other means to deepen appreciation of what is involved. (For a broad philosophical discussion relevant to questions of intelligibility the recent book “Basic Structures of Reality: Meta-physics” by the well-known English philosopher Colin McGinn is sometimes recommended.)

To achieve enhanced computational performance by quantum means, quantum computers exploit a technique called “quantum annealing”. This is a process whereby optimal mathematical solutions are distilled from all possible solutions.  Put simply, this means that all possible solutions are explored at the same time – using quantum superposition - and the optimal solution chosen, rather than working through all possible solutions one at a time.  Crucially, this is only possible through an effect in physics called “quantum tunneling” which can provides each qubit with an awareness of every other one.

In contrast the standard computer based on the Turing design operate on the basis of performing one calculation at a time. Standard home computers operate with processors typically in the region of 32-64 bits.  The D-Wave Two computer runs on a 512 qubit processor.

Benchmarking tests by NASA and Google showed that their new D-Wave Two took half a second to complete a task that took a standard computer using conventional software 30 minutes to complete.

This latest collaboration between NASA, Google and the Universities Space Research Association (USRA) will mean that access is shared to new D-Wave Two which is to be housed at NASA’s Ames Research Centre in California.

Google has declared its immediate interest in using the facility to investigate how quantum computing might advance techniques of machine learning and artificial intelligence, including voice recognition. University researchers will have access to the computer via the Universities Space Research Agency for 20% of the time.  It is expected that NASA will use the computer for scheduling problems and planning.

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