{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"The New Quantum Era - innovation in quantum computing, science and technology","title":"Probability First: Understanding Quantum Computing with James Whitfield","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":4081,"description":"Welcome to another episode of The New Quantum Era Podcast hosted by Kevin Rowney and Sebastian Hassinger. Today, they are joined by James Whitfield, who's a professor at Dartmouth College and is a colleague of Sebastian’s at Amazon Web Services’ quantum team. James has a quantum chemistry background, and, as a result, he brings that sensibility to his work in quantum information science.In today’s episode, they cover three main topics:They talk about the specific areas of quantum chemistry where progress in quantum computation can be seen towards cracking key problems.They address the intuitive nature of perceiving entanglement within quantum states and how those manifest in quantum algorithms (excellent material for people trying to get on top of that challenging concept).James shares his perspectives on enhancing pedagogy in Quantum Information Science, both in the K -12 range and at the graduate level. Key Takeaways:[4:06] James talks about his background.[6:37] What's the simplest way to explain what quantum chemistry is?[8:18] James shares framing remarks on the merit of quantum computing in these early phases regarding its applicability to physical chemistry. [10:30] James talks about the concept of time evolution.[11:13] James explains the differences between the dynamical nature and the optimization nature of a problem.[13:06] James speaks of what happens inside of quantum time evolution.[14:54] Geometry optimization is only one problem that people discuss.[16:47] James talks about the ‘clamped nuclei’ approximation.[17:33] James describes the two ways of thinking about the Schrodinger equation.[19:59] What types of things would we be able to do if we could model time intervals? [24:09] Does James think that, in terms of time evolutions,  fairly large numbers of fault-tolerant qubits are needed to do useful calculations? Or is there a class of problems that NISQ or even Analog Devices like QuEra could be helpful with?[27:13] What is entanglement entropy?...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/0bJ0_ffy0r0O2l32QT5Tn9-3l9jtqpUcMVwNZnZXwRM/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS8yZmZl/YmRlZTAxNDY3MWJk/NmI2MGVkMGMxYmFh/MTM2Mi5wbmc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}