Current students

ETSI and the Institute for Quantum Computing are pleased to announce the 10th ETSI/IQC Quantum Safe Cryptography Conference, taking place in Singapore on May 14-16, 2024. The event will be hosted by the Centre for Quantum Technologies, National University of Singapore.

This event was designed for members of the business, government, and research communities with a stake in cryptographic standardization to facilitate the knowledge exchange and collaboration required to transition cyber infrastructures and business practices to make them safe in an era with quantum computers. It aims to showcase both the most recent developments from industry and government and cutting-edge potential solutions coming out of the most recent research.

Quantum Nano Centre, 200 University Ave West, Room QNC 1201
Waterloo, ON CA N2L 3G1

Two randomly selected audience members will get the opportunity to present their work on the whiteboard for 20-minutes each.

IQC Seminar - Jong-Souk Yeo, Yonsei University

Quantum Nano Centre, 200 University Ave West, Room QNC 0101
Waterloo, ON, CA N2L 3G1

Biomimetic or nature-Inspired technologies are referring to the emerging fields where innovations are strongly inspired by the wisdom from nature or biological systems. Multiple levels of approaches are feasible from nature-inspiration – adaptation of how nature works, adoption of what nature provides, or replication of natural processes and functionalities for eco-friendly, sustainable, and highly efficient technologies. In this talk, nature-inspired approaches will be introduced for the nano-bio and nano-IT convergence research in the areas of nanostructure-cell interactions [1], nano-bio sensorics [2], biomimetic optical nanostructures [3], stretchable electronics [4], quantum plasmonics [5], and neuromorphic semiconductor technologies. Along with the research, recent efforts at Yonsei University will be introduced about the School of Integrated Technology where research and education are organically integrated for the technology convergence, and Yonsei Science Park where innovation ecosystem is established for IT-Bio Cluster Hub hosting Global Bio Campus and IBM quantum computer. This research was supported by the MSIT (Ministry of Science and ICT), Korea, under the ICT Consilience Creative program (IITP-2019-2017-0-01015) supervised by the IITP (Institute for Information & communications Technology Planning & Evaluation), the Ministry of trade, Industry and Energy (MOTIE) and Korea Institute for Advancement of Technology (KIAT) through the International Cooperative R&D program (Project No. P0019630) and by the Human Frontier Science Program (RGP0047/2019).

Online webinar through Microsoft Teams

The University of Waterloo and Mitacs will be holding a joint webinar on Thursday, November 23^rd at 10am to share information about their new Globalink Research Award (Quantum stream), which provides funding for bilateral student travel with international university labs.

In this session, Amanda Green and Etienne Pineault, Senior Advisors with Mitacs, will provide information and updates on how to leverage Mitacs funding to build collaborative research projects with international university partners. 

Following the presentation, we will answer your questions about finding a partner, deciding on Mitacs eligibility and navigating program requirements (including how to work with our team to submit successful funding applications). Regan Child, International Grants and Contracts Manager with the Office of Research, will be on hand to offer assistance.

IQC, CS, & MATH seminar - Eric Culf, University of Waterloo 

Quantum Nano Centre, 200 University Ave West, Room QNC 1201
Waterloo, ON, CA N2L 3G1 +ZOOM

Problems based on the structure of graphs -- for example finding cliques, independent sets, or colourings -- are of fundamental importance in classical complexity. It is well motivated to consider similar problems about quantum graphs, which are an operator system generalisation of graphs. Defining well-formulated decision problems for quantum graphs faces several technical challenges, and consequently the connections between quantum graphs and complexity have been underexplored.

In this work, we introduce and study the clique problem for quantum graphs. Our approach utilizes a well-known connection between quantum graphs and quantum channels. The inputs for our problems are presented as quantum channels induced by circuits, which implicitly determine a corresponding quantum graph. We also use this approach to reimagine the clique and independent set problems for classical graphs, by taking the inputs to be circuits of deterministic or noisy channels which implicitly determine confusability graphs. We show that, by varying the collection of channels in the language, these give rise to complete problems for the classes NP, MA, QMA, and QMA(2). In this way, we exhibit a classical complexity problem whose natural quantisation is QMA(2), rather than QMA, which is commonly assumed.       

To prove the results in the quantum case, we make use of methods inspired by self-testing. To illustrate the utility of our techniques, we include a new proof of the reduction of QMA(k) to QMA(2) via cliques for quantum graphs. We also study the complexity of a version of the independent set problem for quantum graphs, and provide preliminary evidence that it may be in general weaker in complexity, contrasting to the classical case where the clique and independent set problems are equivalent.       

This talk is based on work with Arthur Mehta (arxiv.org/abs/2309.12887)

Tracial embedded strategy: lifting MIP* tricks to MIPco

Quantum Nano Centre, 200 University Ave West, Room QNC 1201
Waterloo, ON CA N2L 3G1

Quantum non-local games have been an important object of study for the operator algebra and computer science community due to the recent ground-breaking result MIP*=RE. Although the majority of the study has been focused on the tensor product model in the non-local games literature recently, the commuting operator model is another model that is also considered in the non-local literature, and the difference between these two models forms the basis for disproving the famous Connes embeddings conjecture. In this talk, I will introduce a new set of strategies for the commuting operator model, the tracial embedded strategy, and sketch the proof that every strategy in the commuting operator model can be approximated by this set of strategies. Using this new characterization, I will present some similarities between the tensor product model and the commuting operator model in the complexity theory realm. This talk is based on the paper "Almost synchronous correlation in the commuting operator model".

Live on YouTube

Join us for Quantum Today, where we sit down with researchers from the University of Waterloo’s Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC) to talk about their work, its impact and where their research may lead.

In this special session, we’ll be joined by Joan Arrow and Özge Gülsayin of the Quantum Ethics Project, a team of researchers exploring the intersection of quantum and society. We’ll discuss how to advocate for the responsible and inclusive development of quantum technologies through education and research, and why an ethics lens is important in even the early stages of technological innovation.