How quantum computing could transform everything everywhere, but not all at once by alan boyle on April 30, 2023 at 5: 45 am

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How quantum computing could change everything everywhere
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How quantum computing could
transform everything everywhere, but
not all at once
BY 
ALAN BOYLE
 on 
April 30, 2023 at 5:45 am
Quantum computing could change our perspective on the cosmos. (Illustration: Harmonia
Macrocosmica, 1660 / Microsoft, 2022 / Alan Boyle)
What does quantum computing have in common with the Oscar-winning
movie 
“Everything Everywhere All at Once”
? One is a mind-blowing work
of fiction, while the other is an emerging frontier in computer science —
but both of them deal with rearrangements of particles in superposition
that don’t match our usual view of reality.
Fortunately, theoretical physicist Michio Kaku has provided a guidebook to
the real-life frontier, titled 
“Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum
Computer Revolution Will Change Everything.”
“We’re talking about the next generation of computers that are going to
replace digital computers,” Kaku says in the latest episode of the 
Fiction
Science podcast
. “Today, for example, we don’t use the abacus anymore

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in Asia. … In the future, we’ll view digital computers like we view the
abacus: old-fashioned, obsolete. This is for the garbage can. That’s how
the future is going to evolve.”
Computer scientists might take issue with Kaku’s digital doomsaying — but
there’s little doubt that quantum computers will transform the field as much
as artificial intelligence is transforming it today.
“Quantum computing could very well revolutionize what an Amazon Web
Services or Microsoft Azure will want to do for the world in terms of
computing,” says Louis Terminello, associate laboratory director for
physical and computational sciences at the U.S. Department of
Energy’s 
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
.
Kaku’s assessment of the potential impact goes a lot further: In his view,
any problem that involves sifting through a multiverse worth of possibilities
will become more solvable once the quantum revolution takes hold.
Energy generation and storage, food production, climate modeling,
disease treatment and genetic repair are all potential targets for quantum
supremacy.
Why is that? In contrast to the rigid one-or-zero approach that serves as
the foundation of classical computing, quantum computers would take
advantage of the fact that quantum bits — better known as qubits — can
represent multiple states when information is processed.

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“Quantum computers, in principle, are infinitely more powerful than a
digital computer that computes on zeros and ones, zeros and ones,
because quantum computers are quantum mechanical,” he said. “The
atom can spin in any direction. How many directions are there? An infinite
number of directions.”
Tech titans haven’t yet settled on the best basis for quantum computing:
Amazon, Google and IBM use 
superconducting circuits
 in their hardware.
IonQ — which is 
creating a research and manufacturing facility in the
Seattle area
 — favors a technology based on trapped ions. Other
companies are taking advantage of the 
quantum properties of photons
,
or 
defects in silicon lattices
. And Microsoft is placing its bets on 
topological
superconducting nanowires
.
Which technology will win out? Kaku says it’s too early to tell.
“How many quantum computer architectures are possible? An infinite
number of them,” he says. “Now, of course, only a handful of them are
practical and economical. But the point I’m raising is that Mother Nature
has already devised millions of quantum mechanical systems, and we’re
playing catch-up to Mother Nature. And so I think that one day, one or or a
handful of these technologies will dominate the whole field, but we’re not
sure yet.”

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“Quantum Supremacy: How the Quantum
Computer Revolution Will Change
Everything,” by Michio Kaku (Doubleday /
Penguin Random House)
Even though full-fledged quantum computers 
aren’t yet ready to prime
time
, researchers are already trying to figure out how to simulate the
quantum mechanisms behind important biological processes such
as 
photosynthesis
 and 
nitrogen fixation
. Coming up with new molecular
methods to perform those tasks could be worth billions of dollars.
“About 1% or so of the world’s energy goes to the process to refine
nitrogen in the air to create fertilizer,” Kaku says. “But it’s very wasteful. …
We need a quantum mechanical Green Revolution.”
On the energy frontier, quantum computers could help engineers
design 
better reactors for generating fusion power
 — and help chemists
design new types of materials for 
solar cells
and 
batteries
.

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Kaku says chemistry is a prime target for the quantum revolution.
“Chemists who do not use quantum computers to model chemical
reactions will go bankrupt,” he says. “They’ll be out of a job. They’ll be
replaced by chemists who do use quantum computers. This means all
medicine. All medicine can eventually be reduced to a quantum computer.”
Once quantum computers take hold, researchers could 
design synthetic
molecules for medicines
 that address specific maladies.
“How do we find new drugs today? Trial and error,” Kaku says. “We have
thousands of Petri dishes with chemicals in them. We tediously see
whether or not they have any antibiotic properties. Why not do that in the
memory of a quantum computer?”
Quantum calculations could also direct the course of gene-editing
therapies with the potential of heading off diseases before they arise — an
application that 
raises hopes
 as well as 
ethical concerns
.
“Any discipline that requires the use of molecules and atoms can be
helped by the quantum revolution, including cancer research, aging. Why
do we die? Think about it for a moment: There are zero laws of physics
that say that we have to die,” Kaku says.
Doesn’t immortality run counter to the 
Second Law of Thermodynamics
?
“If I have an open system and I use quantum computers to add extra
energy from outside, I can begin the process of stopping the aging
process,” Kaku says. “Think about that: the possibility of extending the
human lifespan by reducing the buildup of errors in our DNA. … The
applications are endless.”
He’s even hoping that next-generation computing will help him solve the
mysteries of string theory and reveal the so-called Theory of Everything,
which Kaku calls 
the God Equation
. That hope is what led him to write
“Quantum Supremacy” in the first place.
Kaku has been working on string theory for decades, and he’s the author
of 
one of the leading textbooks
 about it. But he says the theory is “so
complicated, with so many resonances, that the human mind has not been
able to solve string theory.”

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“What a frustrating thing,” he says. “So I said to myself, wait a minute.
String theory is a quantum theory, like the atom. Why not use quantum
computers to solve a quantum problem?”
By now, you’ve probably gotten the message that Kaku is bullish on the
quantum revolution. Is he willing to admit there’s something that quantum
computers 
can’t
do? Yes, as a matter of fact.
If a movie like “Everything Everywhere All at Once” makes it look as if you
can slip back and forth between quantum universes, Kaku says you should
know that’s pure fiction. “It doesn’t work that way,” he says. “It turns out
that it takes an enormous amount of energy and time to go between
universes. So, believe it or not, it may be possible to go between
universes, but it’s not for us.”
In other words, not even the quantum computer revolution can change
everything everywhere all at once.