ORNL Develops Quantum Chemistry Simulation Benchmark to Evaluate Performance of Quantum Devices

(EurekaAlert) Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) have developed a quantum chemistry simulation benchmark to evaluate the performance of quantum devices and guide the development of applications for future quantum computers.
We are currently running fairly simple scientific problems that represent the sort of problems we believe these systems will help us to solve in the future,” said ORNL’s Raphael Pooser, principal investigator of the Quantum Testbed Pathfinder project. “These benchmarks give us an idea of how future quantum systems will perform when tackling similar, though exponentially more complex, simulations.”
Pooser and his colleagues calculated the bound state energy of alkali hydride molecules on 20-qubit IBM Tokyo and 16-qubit Rigetti Aspen processors. These molecules are simple and their energies well understood, allowing them to effectively test the performance of the quantum computer.