Uploaded December 2021 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Quantum computing offers the allure of an exponential speed-up to the solution of important problems in an array of fields from basic science and medicine to national security. However, in order to realize the potential of quantum computing, research is needed not only on quantum devices and qubits but on quantum computers themselves. Now, for the first time, this has been made possible with the Quantum Scientific Computing Open User Testbed (QSCOUT).
In order to enable the study of the quantum computer itself, researchers need access to the low-level primitive operations of the machine. In the QSCOUT machine this done by manipulating ions with laser pulses of varying amplitude, frequency, phase and duration. Access at such a low-level in a quantum computer is so unprecedented that a team of computer scientists needed to create a new quantum assembly language so that users could program the computer.
The primary goal of the QSCOUT project is to build, maintain and provide access to a quantum processor based on trapped ion technology to the scientific community at large. In other words, QSCOUT is a quantum computer for scientists, by scientists.
SAND2021-6333 V
Quantum computing offers the allure of an exponential speed-up to the solution of important problems in an array of fields from basic science and medicine to national security. However, in order to realize the potential of quantum computing, research is needed not only on quantum devices and qubits but on quantum computers themselves. Now, for the first time, this has been made possible with the Quantum Scientific Computing Open User Testbed (QSCOUT).
In order to enable the study of the quantum computer itself, researchers need access to the low-level primitive operations of the machine. In the QSCOUT machine this done by manipulating ions with laser pulses of varying amplitude, frequency, phase and duration. Access at such a low-level in a quantum computer is so unprecedented that a team of computer scientists needed to create a new quantum assembly language so that users could program the computer.
The primary goal of the QSCOUT project is to build, maintain and provide access to a quantum processor based on trapped ion technology to the scientific community at large. In other words, QSCOUT is a quantum computer for scientists, by scientists.
SAND2021-6333 V
