University of Copenhagen mathematicians have developed a recipe for upgrading quantum computers to simulate complex quantum systems, such as molecules. Their discovery brings us closer to being able to predict how new drugs will behave within our bodies and has the potential to revolutionize pharmaceutical development. Developing a new drug can take more than a decade and cost anywhere from hundreds of millions to billions of euro -; with multiple failed attempts along the way.
But what if we could predict how a drug worked in the body before its laboratory trials, and in doing so, speed up the entire process from years to months? Drugs are composed of molecules, which in turn consist of atoms. And since atoms behave in a quantum mechanical manner, a quantum computer is needed to mimic their behavior. Herein lies the challenge.
A traditional computer -; no matter how big -; could never manage the vast amount of information required by the task with the same precision. At the University of Copenhagen's Quantum for Life Centre, a team of physicists, computer scientists, and mathematicians has dedicated years of their careers to understanding how so-called quantum simulators, a type of specialized quantum computer, can be deployed for this task: to simulate, and in doing so predict, the behaviour of molecules. It's all about size, or is it? One fundamental problem that all quantum computer researchers struggle with is size.
Today's quantum computers are simply too small. In prac.
