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SUMMARY:Recent advances in quantum annealing and outlook on its potential 
 in statistics - Georg Hahn (Lancaster University)
DTSTART:20180412T100000Z
DTEND:20180412T110000Z
UID:TALK103714@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:INI IT
DESCRIPTION:Since the 1970s\, the potential of quantum computing has been 
 a field of extensive research\, particularly its advantages and disadvanta
 ges over classical computing. This research\, however\, was theoretical si
 nce physical quantum devices were unavailable. With the recent availabilit
 y of the first adiabatic computers (or quantum annealers)\, computational 
 mathematics and statistics (as all other computational sciences) are provi
 ded with a new means of great potential. This talk will begin with an intr
 oduction to quantum annealing and proceed with a presentation of recent ad
 vances in the field. Special focus will be given to two topics: Solving th
 e NP-hard problem of finding cliques in a graph and the reduction of binar
 y quadratic forms for scalable quantum annealing. Further relevant works w
 ill be discussed\, especially those exploring the statistical properties o
 f quantum annealing. To stimulate discussion\, the talk will highlight fut
 ure directions of research\, in particular the statistical analysis of the
  (empirical) distribution of annealing solutions\, the characterisation of
  classes of statistical methods allowing formulations suitable for quantum
  computation (and hence almost instant solutions)\, and the exploitation o
 f the inherent randomness in adiabatic computing for statistical purposes.
  <br><br><br><br>
LOCATION:Seminar Room 2\, Newton Institute
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