title: From transistor to trapped-ion computers for quantum chemistry.
abstract: Over the last few decades, quantum chemistry has progressed through the development of computational methods based on modern digital computers. However, these methods can hardly fulfill the exponentially-growing resource requirements when applied to large quantum systems. As pointed out by Feynman, this restriction is intrinsic to all computational models based on classical physics. Recently, the rapid advancement of trapped-ion technologies has opened new possibilities for quantum control and quantum simulations. Here, we present an efficient toolkit that exploits both the internal and motional degrees of freedom of trapped ions for solving problems in quantum chemistry, including molecular electronic structure, molecular dynamics, and vibronic coupling. We focus on applications that go beyond the capacity of classical computers, but may be realizable on state-of-the-art trapped-ion systems. These results allow us to envision a new paradigm of quantum chemistry that shifts from the current transistor to a near-future trapped-ion-based technology.
authors.affiliation: 1] Center for Quantum Information, Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, P. R. China [2] Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge MA, 02138, USA [3].
authors.forename: M-H
authors.initials: MH
authors.lastname: Yung
authors.affiliation: 1] Department of Physical Chemistry, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Apartado 644, 48080 Bilbao, Spain [2].
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Casanova
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Chemistry, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Apartado 644, 48080 Bilbao, Spain.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mezzacapo
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge MA, 02138, USA.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: McClean
authors.affiliation: Department of Physical Chemistry, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Apartado 644, 48080 Bilbao, Spain.
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Lamata
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge MA, 02138, USA.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Aspuru-Guzik
authors.affiliation: 1] Department of Physical Chemistry, University of the Basque Country UPV/EHU, Apartado 644, 48080 Bilbao, Spain [2] IKERBASQUE, Basque Foundation for Science, Alameda Urquijo 36, 48011 Bilbao, Spain.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Solano