Trustworthy Quantum Computing: Improving the Reliability and Security of Quantum Computers

Quantum computers (QCs) have the potential to tackle certain problems beyond the capabilities of classical supercomputers; however, they face two major challenges: the inherent noisiness of quantum hardware significantly reduces their reliability, and privacy concerns arise from executing quantum programs on potentially untrusted quantum cloud providers. In this talk, I will discuss my contributions to enhancing the fidelity and security of QCs, highlighting the significant potential of designing software policies at the application layer in unlocking the full potential of near-term QCs. I will first discuss FrozenQubits, a software policy that substantially boosts the fidelity of Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) applications by identifying and removing hotspot qubits, which are key contributors to noise in quantum programs, thereby achieving higher fidelity in noisy QCs. Next, I will discuss Enigma, a suite of Secure Quantum Computing (SQC) schemes specifically designed for QAOA. Unlike previous SQC techniques that obfuscate quantum circuits, Enigma encrypts the input problem of QAOA, such that the resulting circuit and the outcomes are unintelligible to the server. Enigma is distinguished as the first and the only SQC protocol ready for deployment on current and near-term QCs.

Dr. Ramin Ayanzadeh is a postdoctoral researcher at Georgia Tech and is honored to be one of the 59 Computing Innovations Fellows awarded by the NSF/CRA. He received his PhD from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. His primary research area is the system and architecture of quantum computers and emerging accelerators, and he is also engaged in quantum machine learning and applying quantum computers to complex real-world problems. He has made contributions to venues such as ASPLOS, QCE, CAL, and Nature Scientific Reports. His work on "reinforced quantum annealing" and "multi-qubit correction" has been recognized as the "top 100 papers in physics" and the "editor's choice for quantum computing" by Nature's Scientific Reports, respectively. Ramin is a recipient of the NIH/Meyerhoff Graduate Fellowship and the Google Lime Scholarship, and has earned second place in the ACM Student Research Competition.