重大突破！IBM宣布推出世界上第一个商用「通用」量子计算服务

2017年3月6日 作者Bob Yirka

IBM已经宣布准备开始提供世界上第一个商业通用量子计算服务（称为IBM Q），该系统将在今年晚些时候提供给那些希望使用它的用户。 新系统将建立在IBM的Quantum Experience上，这是一个软件开发平台，供对此感兴趣的程序员和开发人员来设计和构建实际的基于量子的应用程序。

量子计算机是全新而独特的，还在早期发展阶段。 它们使用量子位而不是我们都知道的数字0和1，所以估计有一天能够解决现在无法解决的问题或运行如今看似不可能的应用程序。IBM的团队建议大家设想一下，一如果台计算机，可以忠实地模拟自然的几乎无限多种交互和关系，将会多么神奇！

作为IBM Q的推出的一部分，IBM还将发布用于Quantum Experience的新API和升级的模拟器。 今年晚些时候，公司还将发布一个完整的SDK。 该公司希望它能帮助世界各地的程序员以全新的方式学习代码，这将带来前所未有的新型软件应用程序能，让我们够利用通用量子计算机的独特能力。

IBM开始销售量子计算服务的同时，公司仍将继续开发量子计算硬件作为其系统的核心。 他们设定了在未来几年内建立50-qubit（量子比特）系统的目标。 然而，他们没有公布客户在系统上线时可以期望的量子量 - 当前Quantum Experience用户可以访问5量子比特计算。 该公司采用了将量子位与超导电路结合的方法，将其保持在刚好高于绝对零度的温度。

在其公告中，IBM相信客户（或学术界）将乐于使用Quantum Experience这一量子程序去构建自己的应用程序，然后通过IBM Q云端执行它们。他们注意到，Quantum Experience刚刚启动不到一年，但已经有超过4万名用户构建并运行了275,000个测试应用程序，迄今为止已经产生了15篇研究论文。

IBM has announced its plans to begin offering the world"s first commercial universal quantum-computing service—called IBM Q, the system will be made available to those who wish to use it for a fee sometime later this year. The new system will build on IBM"s Quantum Experience, a software development platform for programmers and developers interested in designing and building actual quantum-based applications.

Quantum computers are new and different, and still very much under development. They run using quantum bits rather than the digital 0s and 1s we all know so well, and are therefore expected one day to be capable of solving problems or running applications that today are impossible. Imagine, the team at IBM suggests, a computer that could faithfully model nature in its nearly infinite variety of interactions and relationships.

As part of the roll out of IBM Q, IBM will also release a new API for Quantum Experience and an upgraded simulator. Later this year, the company will also release a full SDK. The company expects it to help programmers around the world learn to code in a whole new way that will result in unprecedented software applications able to take advantage of the unique abilities of a universal quantum computer.

Even as IBM begins selling quantum computing services, the company will continue to develop the quantum computing hardware at the core of its system. They have set a goal of building a 50-qubit system over the next few years. However, they have not revealed the quantum volume customers can expect when the system goes online—current Quantum Experience users have access to 5 qubit computing. The company has embraced the approach of incorporating qubits with superconducting circuits by keeping them at temperatures just above absolute zero.

In its announcement, IBM suggests it believes customers (or academics) will want to use Quantum Experience to build their own applications using quantum programming, which will then execute via the cloud on IBM Q. They note that Quantum Experience was launched just less than a year ago, but already over 40,000 users have built and run 275,000 test applications and 15 research papers have resulted thus far.

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