Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video] • Hacker News Board

Re: Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video]

#11

Post by kumarski » Fri, Sep 30, 2016, 12:03 PM UTC

6nf wrote: post #8

kumarski wrote: post #7

I don't think quantum computing will have any sort of impact on drug discovery. Chad mentioned quantum computing's impact on drugs. Anybody know what he's referring to? I haven't seen anything to suggest that there's big problems out there waiting to be solved by powerful computing capabilities. Has anyone else found something that suggests there's active problems waiting for quantum computers? I've always found the…

He means using computational chemistry to predict what different drugs might do without actually having to produce them one by one first. We are terrible at predicting how large molecules will act because they are complex quantum systems. So using a quantum computer to model them will hopefully be very successful.

Math doesn't magically understand chemistry and context.

Biology simply isn't that discrete. It's like 4000 years of spaghetti code.

Re: Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video]

#12

Post by adamgravitis » Fri, Sep 30, 2016, 10:04 PM UTC

kumarski wrote: post #7

I don't think quantum computing will have any sort of impact on drug discovery. Chad mentioned quantum computing's impact on drugs. Anybody know what he's referring to? I haven't seen anything to suggest that there's big problems out there waiting to be solved by powerful computing capabilities. Has anyone else found something that suggests there's active problems waiting for quantum computers? I've always found the…

The main computationally intractable problems around drug discovery surround protein folding and identifying macromolecule shapes. This is necessary to infer receptor sites for potential drug targets.

The problem is massively intractable. QC could revolutionize the space.

Re: Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video]

#13

Post by 6nf » Sat, Oct 01, 2016, 3:05 AM UTC

kumarski wrote: post #11

6nf wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He means using computational chemistry to predict what different drugs might do without actually having to produce them one by one first. We are terrible at predicting how large molecules will act because they are complex quantum systems. So using a quantum computer to model them will hopefully be very successful.

Math doesn't magically understand chemistry and context. Biology simply isn't that discrete. It's like 4000 years of spaghetti code.

Have you studied computational chemistry?

Re: Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video]

#14

Post by Hydraulix989 » Sat, Oct 01, 2016, 7:16 AM UTC

adamgravitis wrote: post #12

kumarski wrote: post #7

I don't think quantum computing will have any sort of impact on drug discovery. Chad mentioned quantum computing's impact on drugs. Anybody know what he's referring to? I haven't seen anything to suggest that there's big problems out there waiting to be solved by powerful computing capabilities. Has anyone else found something that suggests there's active problems waiting for quantum computers? I've always found the…

The main computationally intractable problems around drug discovery surround protein folding and identifying macromolecule shapes. This is necessary to infer receptor sites for potential drug targets. The problem is massively intractable. QC could revolutionize the space.

Remember though, NP complete problems still are intractable (exponential complexity) even for quantum computers, to say nothing of NP hard.

Unger and Moult (1993) have shown a three-dimensional protein folding model to be NP-complete, and a two- and three-dimensional mathematical model describing the folding process as a free energy minimization problem is NP-hard:

https://www.gwern.net/docs/1993-fraenkel.pdf

Re: Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video]

#15

Post by Hydraulix989 » Sat, Oct 01, 2016, 7:24 AM UTC

I'm curious what the MVP is? Despite the whole counterargument to Eric Ries school of thought, even YC's thesis is that "hard companies" should have some sort of initial stepping stone.

Re: Chad Rigetti on Building Quantum Computers [video]

#16

Post by MCneill27 » Tue, Oct 04, 2016, 2:19 PM UTC

Hydraulix989 wrote: post #15

I'm curious what the MVP is? Despite the whole counterargument to Eric Ries school of thought, even YC's thesis is that "hard companies" should have some sort of initial stepping stone.

I'm curious why he pronounces Regina incorrectly (he went to the University of Regina), when he is from Moose Jaw, a 50 minute drive away. It's really really strange. 7 year old children all across Canada know how to pronounce that city correctly...how does a guy forget something so basic?