In 1943, Thomas Watson, then president of IBM, said “I think there is a world market for maybe five computers.”

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“I bet you’ve got three computers on your desk right now,” said Joseph Salfi, a newly appointed researcher at the Stewart Blusson Quantum Matter Institute (SBQMI). Salfi is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering in the Faculty of Applied Science, and his work as an experimentalist in the area of quantum information science and computing has brought him into collaboration with researchers including Lukas Chrostowski, Jeff Young, Joshua Folk, Roman Krems, Robert Raussendorf, Mona Berciu, and others.

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Quantum computation, a research field that falls under the umbrella of quantum information science, is an extremely exciting research field and rapidly emerging industry where researchers are developing science and technology with the potential to revolutionize computation. Applications for quantum computers involve calculations on complex systems to answer very difficult questions, from how to optimize aircraft maintenance to how to build more powerful systems of artificial intelligence.

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“I tell my students that they will be among the first people trained in the field who will not just become researchers in quantum computing, but who will also have the opportunity to translate the science into practice to make industrially relevant quantum computers. Small quantum computers already work, and larger ones are on the cusp of delivering their promise,” said Salfi. “It’s up to us to figure out what we are going to do with quantum computers; how to build them and make them better, and how to make them accessible; that’s what’s really exciting right now.”

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Salfi led the UBC’s first graduate level quantum computing foundations course for both engineers and physicists, EECE 571S, in 2019, and has partnered with Chrostowski and the CREATE program in order to train the next generation of quantum computing leaders. The program unites faculty across three universities, and offers foundational, technical and career training for students in a range of disciplines, from engineering and computer science to physics and chemistry.

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“I really enjoyed teaching this course; teaching foundational material is really fun because there are so many surprising ideas in quantum computing,” said Salfi. “You also interact with a greater number of students, and you explore ideas outside your traditional area of focus in research.”

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Salfi is a collaborative researcher, and one of the major things that drew him to SBQMI is its proclivity for collaboration and engagement, both among members of the academic research community and more broadly with administrative staff, industry partners, and other universities.

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“The idea of bringing people together is so simple, but it is so critical to be in an environment with that critical mass of expertise, support, and infrastructure,” said Salfi. “From the cutting-edge research facilities to scientific leadership to the presence of skilled scientific staff; as individual investigators we can build capable laboratories, but there is so much that you simply cannot do on your own.”

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In the lab, Salfi and his team are working to build controllable quantum systems in order to do calculations that are hard or impossible to do on classical computers.

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“We build chips that house qubits, and we manipulate quantum information in those qubits so that we can try to understand how they work, and then use them to build more powerful quantum computers that can deliver practical applications,” Salfi said.

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A qubit is the quantum version of the classical bit, the unit of information that in conventional computers can either be a one or a zero. The difference between a qubit and a classical bit is that a qubit can exist in a state that is simultaneously one and zero at the same time. This key difference is what gives quantum computers their potential to solve complex problems; the way that they process information follows the laws of quantum mechanics.

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While researchers and entrepreneurs have ideas about what they might be able to achieve with a robust quantum computer, building one is very challenging for very fundamental reasons: usually, the easier it is to manipulate quantum systems, the more fragile the quantum states are.  

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With increased investment coming from government sources and more recently from the private sector, research has progressed to the point where the first quantum computers now exist, and some can even complete tasks outside the capabilities of classic supercomputers. However, solving real-world problems is likely to require much more powerful quantum computers. For Salfi, this represents a future full of possibility; the combination of fundamental discovery – both up until now and ongoing – and the potential for real social and technological benefits is what attracted him to this field of work.

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“Advances in fundamental physics can really make a technological difference. There’s a right time to be in a research field, and this is just a time when there has been enough success in understanding the fundamental aspects of quantum computing that it has drawn a lot of industrial interest,” said Salfi. “When you have industrial interest, it enhances what you are able to accomplish.”

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As Salfi looks to the future, both as a researcher and an educator, he envisions some critical milestones over the next five to ten years.

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“To enable more powerful general quantum computers – that’s a goal that’s at least five, maybe ten years away, but we’re going to do it and it’s going to give birth to a new industry,” said Salfi. “Another area where we’re hoping to see more immediate progress is in special purpose problems; we’re using quantum simulation to tackle specific types of problems, especially around quantum materials.”

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For Salfi, this offers compelling synergy between his research program and SBQMI.

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 “The majority of supercomputer use at universities right now is to solve materials problems, things that you can’t do effectively with a classical computer,” said Salfi. “To be able to predict chemical reaction rates, train machines, or to calculate the properties of molecules – these are useful applications of quantum computing. This will accelerate the pace of discovery. That’s what excites me about quantum computing; that the physics we’re exploring are going to have real-world impact in one form or another.”