Europe-based global major aerospace and defence group Airbus has launched a global quantum computing development competition. The Airbus Quantum Computing Challenge (AQCC) is intended to stimulate proposals and solutions regarding “complex optimisation and modelisation” (in Airbus’s words) across the complete life cycle of an aircraft, using the capabilities made available by the latest developments in computing.
The group already employs high- performance computing. “With traditional computers approaching their limits, the quantum computer promises to deliver a new level of computational power,” affirms the company. “Airbus is already extending current capacity by integrating and leveraging quantum technologies in fields such as route optimisation and satellite imagery.” The aim of the AQCC is to move scientific developments from the laboratory to the factory by using the recently developed computing technologies for real-world industrial programmes.
The challenge will run for most of this year, with the period for making submissions ending in October. The assessment period will conclude at the end of January 2020. The participants will be informed about the results during the first quarter of next year. It is open to both individuals and teams, academics and startup enterprises, postgraduate students, researchers, PhDs and professionals in the area of quantum computing. They will compete for access to hardware and for the chance to develop their concepts for industrialisation in collaboration with industry experts from Airbus.
“Through the challenge, Airbus is looking to further explore solutions that quantum technologies can bring through the sharing of in-house and external knowledge, data and expertise. Five distinct challenges (designated ‘Problem Statements’ by the group) have been identified in the flight physics domain that have an impact on all aspects of Airbus’s business, from design and operations to airline revenue streams. “With varying degrees of complexity, the statements range from the simple optimisation of aircraft climb to the more complex optimisation of wing-box design.”
Problem Statement 1 is concerned with the optimisation of the climb of an aircraft. Problem Statement 2 is focused on computational fluid dynamics, while number three is concerned with quantum neural networks for solving partial differential equations. Problem Statement 4 is to look at the optimisation of wing-box design, while number five will address aircraft loading optimisation.
Conventional computers are reaching the limits of their capacity and there are challenges and problems that are too big and complex for current computers to deal with. There is just not enough conventional computing power on the planet to handle them. Hence, the development of a totally new computing technology – quantum computing.
All computers store and manipulate information. Convention computers store information in binary 0 and 1 form, and each binary digit is called a bit; these individual bits are manipulated by the computer. Quantum computers operate on a completely different basis. They use the particle physics phenomena discovered through quantum mechanics, such as superposition and entanglement (as well as the long-known phenomenon of interference). The basic unit of information in a quantum computer is a qubit (from quantum bit); qubits are not binary digits but represent atoms, ions, photons or electrons, plus their various control devices, which operate together as memory systems and processing systems.