Welcome To Qiskit Metal
For all those out there interested in building quantum devices of your own, now it’s possible to design quantum hardware with Qiskit Metal, an open-source electronic design automation software for quantum computers.
According to the Qiskit Metal team, designing and simulating a quantum device “has long been a time-intensive, multi-step process spread across several disconnected software suites.”
The team hopes Qiskit Metal will completely revolutionize this process. The first electronic design automation (EDA) tool specifically for quantum computers, Qiskit Metal’s intent is to support the quantum community “innovate and design superconducting quantum devices with ease and to their own specifications using either pre-built or custom components” while also acting as an important tool for researchers’ efforts into newer, more creative forms of quantum technology. But not only that: the team also desires that it will have a use as an effective education tool for any individual wishing to learn more about the hardware side of the industry.
It was in October of last year that the team released Qiskit Metal to a small number of ‘early access community members’ to investigate how the software could improve their design workflow. And the outcome was a positive one. Researchers at IBM, a team at the Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, as well as new users at the Qiskit Hackathon Korea, were able to achieve something that they had never done before: design and analyze quantum processors faster. These positive guinea pigs also gave constructive feedback on how to refine the product — this has been one of the benefits of releasing this software open source.
“Prior to the Qiskit Hackathon Korea event, I heard the news about the IBM Qiskit Metal program, and thought it looked amazing, especially for those starting out with superconducting qubit design like me,” said Sun Kyun, researcher and Hackathon participant based at the Korea Research Institute of Standards and Science (KRISS).
With a “vision is to develop a community-driven universal toolkit capable of orchestrating quantum chip development from concept to fabrication in a simple, scalable, and open framework”, Qiskit Metal is a unique, open-source project designed to help engineers and scientists build superconducting quantum devices effortlessly.
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