U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE

33–124 WASHINGTON : 2019

DISRUPTER SERIES: QUANTUM COMPUTING 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON DIGITAL COMMERCE AND 

CONSUMER PROTECTION 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND 

COMMERCE 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

MAY 18, 2018 

Serial No. 115–131 

( 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Energy and Commerce 

energycommerce.house.gov 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE 

GREG WALDEN, Oregon 

Chairman 

JOE BARTON, Texas 

Vice Chairman 

FRED UPTON, Michigan 

JOHN SHIMKUS, Illinois 

MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas 

MARSHA BLACKBURN, Tennessee 

STEVE SCALISE, Louisiana 

ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio 

CATHY MCMORRIS RODGERS, Washington 

GREGG HARPER, Mississippi 

LEONARD LANCE, New Jersey 

BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky 

PETE OLSON, Texas 

DAVID B. MCKINLEY, West Virginia 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

H. MORGAN GRIFFITH, Virginia 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

BILL JOHNSON, Ohio 

BILLY LONG, Missouri 

LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana 

BILL FLORES, Texas 

SUSAN W. BROOKS, Indiana 

MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma 

RICHARD HUDSON, North Carolina 

CHRIS COLLINS, New York 

KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota 

TIM WALBERG, Michigan 

MIMI WALTERS, California 

RYAN A. COSTELLO, Pennsylvania 

EARL L. ‘‘BUDDY’’ CARTER, Georgia 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

FRANK PALLONE, JR., New Jersey 

Ranking Member 

BOBBY L. RUSH, Illinois 

ANNA G. ESHOO, California 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

DIANA DEGETTE, Colorado 

MICHAEL F. DOYLE, Pennsylvania 

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

G.K. BUTTERFIELD, North Carolina 

DORIS O. MATSUI, California 

KATHY CASTOR, Florida 

JOHN P. SARBANES, Maryland 

JERRY MCNERNEY, California 

PETER WELCH, Vermont 

BEN RAY LUJA ́ N, New Mexico 

PAUL TONKO, New York 

YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York 

DAVID LOEBSACK, Iowa 

KURT SCHRADER, Oregon 

JOSEPH P. KENNEDY, III, Massachusetts 

TONY CA ́ RDENAS, California 

RAUL RUIZ, California 

SCOTT H. PETERS, California 

DEBBIE DINGELL, Michigan 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON DIGITAL COMMERCE AND CONSUMER PROTECTION

ROBERT E. LATTA, Ohio 

Chairman 

GREGG HARPER, Mississippi 

Vice Chairman 

FRED UPTON, Michigan 

MICHAEL C. BURGESS, Texas 

LEONARD LANCE, New Jersey 

BRETT GUTHRIE, Kentucky 

DAVID B. MCKINLEY, West Virgina 

ADAM KINZINGER, Illinois 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

LARRY BUCSHON, Indiana 

MARKWAYNE MULLIN, Oklahoma 

MIMI WALTERS, California 

RYAN A. COSTELLO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

GREG WALDEN, Oregon (ex officio) 

JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, Illinois 

Ranking Member 

BEN RAY LUJA ́ N, New Mexico 

YVETTE D. CLARKE, New York 

TONY CA ́ RDENAS, California 

DEBBIE DINGELL, Michigan 

DORIS O. MATSUI, California 

PETER WELCH, Vermont 

JOSEPH P. KENNEDY, III, Massachusetts 

GENE GREEN, Texas 

FRANK PALLONE, JR., New Jersey (ex 

officio) 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hon. Robert E. Latta, a Representative in Congress from the State of Ohio, 

opening statement ................................................................................................ 1 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 3 

Hon. Janice D. Schakowsky, a Representative in Congress from the State 

of Illinois, opening statement .............................................................................. 3 

Hon. Greg Walden, a Representative in Congress from the State of Oregon, 

prepared statement .............................................................................................. 51 

Hon. Frank Pallone, Jr., a Representative in Congress from the State of 

New Jersey, prepared statement ........................................................................ 52 

WITNESSES

Matthew Putman, Founder and CEO, Nanotronics .............................................. 5 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 7 

Christopher Monroe, Chief Scientist and Founder, IonQ, Professor of Physics, 

University of Maryland ........................................................................................ 10 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 12 

Diana Franklin, Professor, University of Chicago ................................................ 24 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 26 

Michael Brett, CEO, QxBranch .............................................................................. 32 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 34 

(1) 

DISRUPTER SERIES: QUANTUM COMPUTING 

WEDNESDAY, MAY 18, 2018 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON DIGITAL COMMERCE AND CONSUMER

PROTECTION, COMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND COMMERCE, 

Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 9:16 a.m., in room 

2322, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Robert Latta, (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Representatives Latta, Lance, Guthrie, McKinley, 

Kinzinger, Bilirakis, Bucshon, Walters, Costello, Schakowsky, 

Welch, Kennedy, and Green. 

Staff Present: Mike Bloomquist Staff Director; Margaret Tucker 

Fogarty, Staff Assistant; Melissa Froelich, Chief Counsel, Digital 

Commerce and Consumer Protection; Adam Fromm, Director of 

Outreach and Coalitions; Ali Fulling, Legislative Clerk, O&I, Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection; Elena Hernandez, Press 

Secretary; Paul Jackson, Professional Staff, Digital Commerce and 

Consumer Protection; Bijan Koohmaraie, Counsel, Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection; Peter Spencer, Senior Professional 

Staff Member, Energy; Andy Zach, Senior Professional Staff Member, Environment; Greg Zerzan, Counsel, Digital Commerce and 

Consumer Protection; Michelle Ash, Minority Chief Counsel, Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection; Jeff Carroll, Minority 

Staff Director; Caroline Paris-Behr, Minority Policy Analyst; and 

Michelle Rusk, Minority FTC Detailee. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT E. LATTA, A 

REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF OHIO 

Mr. LATTA. Good morning. And again, I would like to welcome 

you all to the Subcommittee on Digital Commerce and Consumer 

Protection here on Energy and Commerce. As I mentioned, we have 

another subcommittee that is running right now, so we will have 

members coming back from first floor, upstairs, during the committee from one to the other. But again, I do thank you all for 

being here today. 

And I will recognize myself for my 5-minute opening statement. 

And again, welcome to the subcommittee in today’s disruptor series 

hearing examining quantum computing. We continue our disrupter 

series as we examine emerging technology supporting U.S. innovation and jobs. This morning, we are discussing the revolutionary 

technology known as quantum computing. This involves harnessing 

the power of physics at its most basic level. Unlike the computers 

2 

we are familiar with we use today, a quantum computer holds the 

potential to be faster and more powerful. This innovation is expected to change every industry and make problems that are impossible to solve today, something that can be solved in a matter 

of days or weeks. 

Efforts to develop a commercially available and practical quantum computer are being pursued around the world. Because of the 

tremendous costs involved in developing a suitable environment for 

a quantum computer to operate, many of these efforts involve government support, both the European Union and China have 

pledged, or already have spent billions to develop a quantum computer. 

In the United States, development of quantum computers is proceeding at the academic, governmental, and private sectors. In addition to the larger and familiar technology companies, smaller 

startups are also leading efforts in this area. We are fortunate to 

have one of these startups, IonQ, to testify today. 

Although a quantum computer holds tremendous potential to 

solve previously noncomputable problems, there are skeptics who 

question whether it will be possible to ever develop such technology. We look forward to our witnesses giving us their thoughts 

on this question. 

On the other hand, some fear that the threats such a computer 

would pose to the traditional computing model, especially when it 

comes to encryption and data security. Some fear that a quantum 

computer would make it nearly impossible to keep future computers secure. Data security and consumer privacy are key concerns of this committee. 

We also look forward to our witnesses addressing this issue as 

well. Quantum computers hold tremendous potential to help solve 

problems involving the discovery of new drugs, developing more efficient supply chains and logistics operations, searching massive 

volumes of data, and developing artificial intelligence. 

Whichever nation first develops a practical quantum computer 

will have a tremendous advantage over its foreign peers. We hope 

our witnesses will help us examine the state of the race to develop 

a quantum computer, and how the United States is doing in that 

race. This is obviously a very dense subject. We also understand 

there are several other areas under development leveraging the 

principle of quantum mechanics. Our goal today is simple: to develop a better understanding of the potential of quantum computers, the obstacles to developing this technology, and what policymakers should be doing to remove barriers and to help spur innovation, competition, and ensure a strong and prepared workforce 

for future jobs. 

As we explore this topic today, I would, again, like to thank our 

witnesses for coming to share their expertise on this very complicated and revolutionary technology. I again appreciate you all 

being here today. 

And at this time, I will yield back my time and recognize the 

gentlelady from Illinois, the ranking member of the subcommittee, 

for 5 minutes. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Latta follows:] 

3 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. ROBERT E. LATTA

Good Morning. Welcome to the Digital Commerce and Consumer Protection Subcommittee, and today’s Disrupter Series hearing examining quantum computing. We 

continue our Disrupter Series as we examine emerging technologies supporting U.S. 

innovation and jobs. 

This morning we are discussing the revolutionary technology known as quantum 

computing. This involves harnessing the power of physics at its most basic level. 

Unlike the computers we are familiar with and use today, a quantum computer 

holds the potential to be faster and more powerful. This innovation is expected to 

change every industry and make problems that are impossible to solve today something that can be solved in a matter of days or weeks. 

Efforts to develop a commercially available and practical quantum computer are 

being pursued around the world. Because of the tremendous costs involved in developing a suitable environment for a quantum computer to operate, many of these efforts involve government support. Both the European Union and China have 

pledged or already spent billions to develop a quantum computer. 

In the United States, development of a quantum computer is proceeding at the 

academic, governmental and private sectors. In addition to larger and familiar technology companies, smaller start-ups are also leading efforts in this area. We are fortunate to have one of these start-ups, Ion-Q, to testify today. 

Although a quantum computer holds tremendous potential to solve previously 

non-computable problems, there are skeptics who question whether it will be possible to ever develop such technology. We look forward to our witnesses giving us 

their thoughts on this question. 

On the other hand, some fear the threat such a computer would pose to the traditional computing model. Especially when it comes to encryption and data security, 

some fear that a quantum computer would make it nearly impossible to keep future 

computers secure. Data security and consumer privacy are key concerns of this 

Committee. We also look forward to our witnesses addressing this issue as well. 

Quantum computers hold tremendous potential to help solve problems involving 

the discovery of new drugs, developing more efficient supply chains and logistics operations, searching massive volumes of data, and developing artificial intelligence. 

Whichever nation first develops a practical quantum computer will have a tremendous advantage over its foreign peers. We hope our witnesses will help us examine 

the state of the race to develop a quantum computer, and state how the U.S is 

doing. 

This is obviously a very dense subject. We also understand there are several other 

areas under development leveraging the principle of quantum mechanics. Our goal 

today is simple: to develop a better understanding of the potential of quantum computers; the obstacles to developing this technology; and, what policymakers should 

be doing to remove barriers and help spur innovation, competition, and ensure a 

strong and prepared workforce for future jobs. 

As we explore this topic today, I would like to again thank our witnesses for traveling to DC and sharing their expertise with us as we examine this complicated and 

revolutionary technology. Thank you. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JANICE D. SCHAKOWSKY, A 

REPRESENTATIVE IN CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ILLINOIS 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Well, I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman. We 

continue our disrupter series with the exploration of quantum computing. I want to congratulate all of you for being so smart. Dr. 

Franklin, I was just told I think it was your mother and I graduated from the University of Illinois about the same time. This was 

a time before we knew anything about computers really, it was just 

beginning. And here you are today, the next generation leading us 

into the future. So I appreciate all of you being here today. 

This technology, I understand, is still in the research phase, but 

the potential applications are tremendous, from healthcare to energy efficiency and everything in between. Given this potential, 

global competitors from the European Union to China are rushing 

4 

to invest in quantum computing. The U.S. must make strategic investments if it wants to stay ahead. And those investments really 

start with STEM education. We must encourage students, including young women and students of color to pursue interests in computer science and physics. Fostering curiosity today prepares young 

minds to become great innovator of tomorrow. 

As a former teacher myself, I strongly believe that our future 

economic success depends on investing in our children’s education. 

Our research universities are leading the way on quantum computing. Public investment is crucial to develop technology until it 

can be profitable, possibly deployed in the private sector. However, 

the Federal Government has so far failed to provide robust reliable 

investments in quantum computing. The lack of investment in 

STEM education and research speaks to the misguided priorities of 

this Republican Congress. While wealthy shareholders get most of 

the gains from a $2 trillion Republican tax bill, Congress is underinvesting in students and research institutions. We fund tax cuts 

for the rich at the expense of our future prosperity. 

Now that Congress has passed a budget agreement, we have the 

chance to make some of the investments that our country so desperately needs. But instead of embracing the opportunity to advance bipartisan appropriations bills, the Republican majority 

plans to bring up a rescission bill to pull back funding for children’s 

health insurance programs and other programs. And today, we will 

be voting on a bill to literally take food out of the mouths of families. 

We need to get our priorities straight. The U.S. can be a global 

leader in quantum computing and other groundbreaking technologies, but only if we prioritize investment for our future over tax 

cuts for the wealthy. 

I look forward to hearing from our panel about the promise of 

quantum computing. I will try my best to follow what you are telling me and the challenges that we face in developing this technology. I am especially proud to welcome Professor Diana Franklin 

from the University of Chicago. The University of Chicago is one 

of the leaders in quantum computing research, and I am eager to 

hear more about this work. 

So thank you, chairman Latta, and I yield back. 

Mr. LATTA. Well, thank you very much. The gentlelady yields 

back. The chairman of the full committee has not made it in yet. 

Is there any one on the Republican side wishing to claim his time? 

If not, at this time that will conclude the member’s opening statements. And to get to the real meat of the issue today that we want 

to hear about. And I won’t tell you how long ago, Madam Ranker, 

how long—when I took computer science in college, I probably 

shouldn’t say this, we used punch cards and teletype machines. It 

was a bad Saturday morning, we went back to the computer 

science department, and you were expecting about that much and 

came back with that much, and you knew you had made a mistake. 

But I want to thank our witnesses for being here with us today and 

we are really looking forward to your testimony today. 

And our witnesses will have an opportunity to make 5-minute 

opening statements. And our witnesses today are Dr. Matthew 

Putman, Founder and CEO of Nanotronics; Dr. Christopher MonVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:19 Feb 08, 2019 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 I:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 115\HEARINGS\115-131 CHRIS
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roe, Chief Scientist and Founder of IonQ, and Professor of Physics 

at the University Maryland; Dr. Diana Franklin, Professor and Director of Computer Science at the University of Chicago; and Mr. 

Michael Brett, CEO of QxBranch. And so again, we appreciate you 

being here today. And Dr. Putman, you are recognized for 5 minutes for your opening statement. If you would just press that 

microphone and pull it close to you and we will get started. 

STATEMENTS OF MATTHEW PUTMAN, FOUNDER AND CEO, 

NANOTRONICS; CHRISTOPHER MONROE, CHIEF SCIENTIST 

AND FOUNDER, IONQ, PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS, UNIVERSITY 

OF MARYLAND; DIANA FRANKLIN, PROFESSOR, UNIVERSITY 

OF CHICAGO; AND MICHAEL BRETT, CEO, QXBRANCH 

STATEMENT OF MATTHEW PUTMAN 

Mr. PUTMAN. Thank you so much, Chairman Latta, Congresswomen and Congressmen. 

Nanotronics does not make quantum computers. We are the 

enablers of technologists and companies that with us strive to revolutionize the way information can be transformed. We have provided some of the world’s largest companies and smaller entrepreneurial innovators with the tools of modern computation and imaging. We work with those that build the most advanced materials 

in microelectronics. Nanotronics achieved this in the only way we 

see feasible for the continued exponential progression of technology, 

which is through artificially intelligent factories. 

Quantum computing not only promises to break the barriers of 

encryption, it also breaks some fundamental barriers to human 

progress. Many of our greatest achievements have been characterized in terms of competition and races. Often, a technological race 

appears to be a war of ideologies or of business dominance. With 

quantum computing, there is an even greater battle, the fight 

against physical scarcity. 

There are three areas that we must work together on to win, not 

only for our nation, but for humanity, agriculture, new fertilizers 

can feed the increasing population of the world while maintaining 

diversity of crops, drug discovery by being able to simulate and 

produce molecules faster and with greater precision than are possible by traditional means. This will not only lead to cures for diseases, but reduce the often financially restrictive experimentation 

and trials that are required to make even incremental improvements and treatments. 

Materials for power devices from batteries to solar cells. These 

have been studied for decades, but in many respects, the United 

States is still early on in this journey. Companies are moving with 

speed, and with national support, it is possible that quantum computing can soon reach an inflection point. 

The race to achieve a workable quantum computer that can reduce scarcity to this level requires greater national attention than 

has currently been realized by either the vast majority of companies, or of the country as a whole. The steps to enabling quantum 

computing will need to involve, one, an effort that funds the creation of factories for new quantum chips. 

6 

A semiconductor fab for classical computers can cost as much as 

$20 billion. To a large extent, these fabs are not being built in the 

United States. We have an opportunity to acknowledge and to 

change this trend by leading the way in the construction of factories for this next generation of powerful computing. 

Two, artificial intelligence. While quantum computing itself will 

increase the capabilities of artificial intelligence, the ability to design materials and software for quantum computers themselves 

will come through the interaction of human and computer agents. 

Understanding such key elements as component design, fabrication conditions, and the number of qubits needed requires collaboration of humans and machines. The number of qubits in a quantum computer is directly related to the number of calculations. A 

10 qubit quantum computer can produce 1,000 calculations, and a 

30 qubit quantum computer can produce 1 billion. Millions of 

qubits are required to achieve the full potential of quantum computing. This exponential growth in qubit to calculations is beyond 

the reach of factories as they are. Without the advanced tools of AI 

for controlling factories, a truly useful quantum computer may not 

be possible. 

Three, education. We need to develop the expertise required for 

the multidisciplinary nature of quantum computer science. It is 

physics, chemistry, mathematics, computer science, and application 

curiosity and expertise are all necessary. We cannot work in isolation. We need to embrace immigration and welcome strong talent 

from around the world with expertise in these areas. 

When we look toward the future, we can see it as a battle of 

ideologies, of resources, or of technologies. Quantum computers encompass all of these to some extent. Quantum mechanics is the 

basis of universal behavior at the smallest scales, but affects the 

largest of matter. It is, therefore, not surprising that harnessing 

this physical property has such far-reaching implications. It is because of this, that it is important that we view it with the powerful 

association that it warrants, with the weight of risk in a fractured 

world, or of great rewards in a unified one. 

As we move forward, we see how quantum computing lets us 

scale in ways that meet not only the needs of industry, but of our 

country and the world. 

Thank you very much. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Putman follows:] 

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Mr. LATTA. Well, thank you for your testimony, this morning. 

And Dr. Monroe, you are recognized for 5 minutes. Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF CHRISTOPHER MONROE 

Mr. MONROE. Thank you for the opportunity to testify, Mr. 

Chairman. I am honored to be here for this committee’s disrupter 

series on quantum computing. 

I am a Quantum Physicist at the University of Maryland, and 

also Co-founder and Chief Scientist at IonQ, which is a startup 

company that aims to build and manufacture small quantum computers. I have also worked with the National Photonics Initiative, 

which is a collaborative alliance among industry, and academics 

with the interest in developing quantum technology. And I, with 

the National Photonics Initiative, we have promoted the idea of a 

National Quantum Initiative, and there is pending legislation that 

is coming up in the House Science Committee. 

So I have about 1 minute to define what quantum computers are, 

and I think I can get to some of the basics. We know that information is stored in bits, zeros, or ones. The fundamental difference in 

quantum information is it is stored in quantum bits, or qubits, 

these can be both zero and one at the same time, as long as you 

don’t look. And at the end of the day, you look, and it randomly 

assumes one of the values. But as long as you don’t look, there is 

a potential for massive parallelism as you add qubits, you get exponential storage capacity. And because quantum computers only 

work while you are not looking, it involves quite revolutionary, and 

even exotic hardware to realize this. Individual atoms, that is the 

technology we use at IonQ, superconducting circuits that are kept 

at very low temperatures, other competing platforms involved that 

type of technology. It is very exotic stuff. And I think within the 

next several years, we are going to see small quantum computers 

with up to about 100 quantum bits. It sounds pretty small, but 

even with 100 quantum bits, it can, in a sense, deal with information that eclipses that of all the hard drives in the world. And on 

our way to a million qubits, where we can do new problems that 

conventional qubit computers could never tackle, we need to build 

the small ones first. 

So in terms of quantum applications, I would say it falls roughly 

into three categories, there are strong overlaps. In the short term, 

quantum sensors can enhance sensitivity to certain measurements 

that could impact navigation, and it may be in a GPS-blind environment and also remote sensing. 

In the medium term, quantum communication networks may 

allow the transmission of information that can be provably secure, 

because remember, quantum information only exists when nobody 

looks at it. If somebody looks at it, it changes. And that can make 

communication inherently secure. 

In the long term, probably the most disruptive technology are 

quantum computers. And quantum computers are not just more 

powerful computers, they are radically different, and they may 

allow us to solve problems that could never, ever be solved using 

classical computers. These involve optimization routines that could 

impact logistics, economic and financial modeling, and also, the design of new materials and molecular function that could impact the 

11 

health sciences and drug delivery, for instance. An even longer 

term, quantum computers could be used to do decryption, breaking 

of popular codes. So there is a security aspect to everything that 

quantum information touches. 

Now, the challenges are pronounced in this field. There are a few 

issues. One involving the workforce and one involving the marketplace. The workforce issue is that universities are chock full of students and faculty that are comfortable with quantum physics, and 

we do research in the area, but we don’t build things that can be 

used by somebody that doesn’t want to or need to know all the details. Whereas industry makes those things, but they don’t have a 

quantum engineering workforce. 

The marketplace is also a challenge because we don’t know exactly what the killer app for quantum computers, in particular, will 

be. So we have promoted the idea of a National Quantum Initiative 

that would establish several large and focused hub labs throughout 

the country, and other components as well, including the user access program for existing quantum computers. It is imperative that 

the U.S. retain its leadership in this technological frontier. As we 

heard from the chairman, there are concerted efforts in Europe 

and, in particular, China, that is spending lots of very focused investments in this field. 

So, in conclusion, quantum technology is coming and the U.S. 

should lead in this next generation of sensors, computers and communication networks. The National Quantum Initiative provides a 

framework for implementing a comprehensive quantum initiative 

across the Federal Government. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, for the opportunity to speak on quantum technology and the need for a nationally focused effort to advanced quantum information science 

and technology in the U.S. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Monroe follows:] 

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Mr. LATTA. Well, thank you very much. 

And Dr. Franklin, you are recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF DIANA FRANKLIN 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Thank you for the opportunity to testify, Mr. 

Chairman, and Ranking Member Schakowsky. I am honored to be 

here before you in the committee to offer testimony on the promise 

of quantum technology. The important role universities must play 

to realize commercialization, and the biggest challenges we are facing in doing so. In my dual roles as Director of Computer Science 

Education at UChicago STEM Ed, and a Research Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of 

Chicago. I research emerging technologies and computer science 

education. 

As lead investigator for quantum education for the EPIC quantum computing project in the NSF expeditions in computing program, it is my mission to design and implement educational initiatives at K–12, university and professional venues to develop a 

quantum computing workforce. 

Quantum computing can be a game changer in promising areas, 

including drug design and food production. By accelerating research time to develop drugs, critical Federal research in Medicaid 

dollars could be saved, along with improved quality of life. 

Unlocking the secrets of nitrogen fixation through quantum simulation could vastly reduce the energy costs of fertilizer production, 

and thus food production throughout the world. While the university has historically been on the forefront of computer science and 

emerging technologies, lapses in academic funding for quantum 

computer science have allowed global competitors to make great 

strides. Putting the U.S. back 10 years from where it could have 

been in research output and workforce development. 

In the past 17 years, since the inception of quantum computer 

science, distinguished from quantum physics and algorithm development, academic funding has only been available for 8 of these 

years, leading to only 10 Ph.D. students being trained, rather than 

a potential of almost 200 students, and no meaningful education 

programs aimed at this area. 

As research groups came and went with the funding, post-docs 

were laid off and graduate students were transitioned to conventional computer science fields. Yet, universities are critical to commercialization. While companies work individually and compete 

against each other to produce proprietary tools, academics produce 

results and tools that all companies can use and improve upon, as 

well as trained experts who can work at companies. They are both 

necessary for the commercialization of quantum computing. 

The challenge of bringing quantum computers to the point of usefulness cannot be underestimated, both in building reliable machines and writing software. Professor Christopher Monroe knows 

extensive expertise in the former. I am here to talk about the increasingly important role that computer scientists must take. Historical funding and theoretical software and quantum devices has 

created a chasm between the software, which assumes large, perfect hardware, and real hardware that is small and unreliable at 

this point. 

25 

NSF has recently recognized this issue supplementing their 

hardware initiative quantumly with a stat program that requires 

an interdisciplinary team that works to bridge this gap. One gap 

is in software development. There is a difference between a quantum algorithm and software that can solve a particular problem. 

Bridging this gap requires interdisciplinary teams such as exists at 

QxBranch. Deep expertise is necessary to figure out how to modify 

software that works in one specific context to another, much more 

so in quantum computing than in traditional computing. If this 

were furniture construction, what we have right now is piles of 

wood, screws and nails. An expert needs to figure out how to use 

those to create useful furniture. Instead, what we want in the future is for nonexperts to be able to go to quantum Ikea, get a 

prefabbed kit and easily modify it for their application. This exists 

for classical computing, but not for quantum computing. 

Another gap is between software and hardware. Current algorithms are written for perfect hardware, but hardware on the horizon is very error prone. We are on a journey to that perfect hardware, but we are not there yet. It is like if you meticulously 

planned to prepare a gourmet meal for ten, but when you arrived, 

there were only supplies for six, and you could only use the kitchen 

for 2 hours prior to the meal, you would need to adjust your plans. 

Current and quantum computers that are on the horizon can only 

sustain computations for a limited time, and they are very small. 

Some modifications can be automated. However, for more advanced 

modifications, the plan needs to be rethought, thus, some of the 

specific hardware limitations, like the specific ways in which different technologies tend to introduce errors, need to be communicated to the programmers so they can figure out how to adjust 

their applications. 

In order to realize quantum computing, Federal funding needs to 

be, first and foremost, consistent, directed at not just building 

hardware and developing algorithms, but to interdisciplinary teams 

that include applications developer and computer scientists. Spread 

across a range of agencies with different missions like NSF, 

DARPA, DOE, and DOD, directed not just at technology development, but to workforce development, so there are more people 

available to write applications and to perform the engineering work 

at these companies. And above all, supporting the K–12 STEM 

pipeline to train the next generation of innovators. 

With a significant investment in hardware, software, and workforce development, I am confident the United States can maintain 

its dominance in computing. 

This concludes my remarks. I appreciate this opportunity to 

speak with subcommittee members. And I am happy to answer any 

questions you might have. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Franklin follows:] 

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Mr. LATTA. Thank you very much. 

And Mr. Brett, you are recognized for 5 minutes. Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF MICHAEL BRETT 

Mr. BRETT. Thank you, Chairman Latta and Ranking Member 

Schakowsky, and members of this committee. I am thrilled to be 

here today to participate in today’s hearing and discuss the opportunities and challenges presented by quantum computing. 

My name is Michael Brett. I am the CEO of a company called 

QxBranch. We are an advanced data analytics company based here 

in Washington, D.C., also with teams in Australia and the U.K. We 

are a fast-growing team of data scientists, software engineers, and 

machine learning specialists who design algorithms for challenging 

data problems. We are at the cutting edge of creating algorithms 

that find patterns, detect anomalies, and uncover other business insights that help our customers reduce their costs and to serve their 

customers better. 

Data analytics is already a rapidly advancing technology area delivering benefits to people all over the world, but we are particularly excited about what quantum computing can do for our business. As we have heard, quantum computers are not just a faster 

computer, they enable an entirely different approach to performing 

calculations. In the realm of quantum physics, there is some incredible and surprising phenomena that, if harnessed, could allow 

us to solve some interesting and practically unsolvable problems, 

like simulating the interaction between molecules. As these molecules grow in size, the computational costs grows exponentially 

larger. 

Our friends who build quantum computing hardware are in the 

process of creating machines that take advantage of these unique 

phenomena. And you heard a great example from Chris Monroe 

this morning at IonQ. These machines allows us as software developers to solve difficult problems using a different kind of mathematics, quantum math, much more efficiently than we ever could 

on classical computers. And our ambition is simple: Quantum computers will allow us to solve some of the most intractable and most 

valuable computational problems that exist today. 

These new quantum solutions will benefit Americans in ways 

they might not ever be aware of. Globally, the race is on to apply 

quantum computing to problems in transport, energy production, 

health science and pharmacology, finance and insurance, defense 

and national security. And we want our applications to be the first 

apps in a quantum apps store. 

Looking forward to the kind of quantum computers that are likely to become commercially available over the next decade, there are 

broadly three classes of application that have become possible in 

the near term. The first are optimization problems, like logistics 

and transport routing, financial portfolio optimization. The second 

is in machine learning, where we can accelerate some of the most 

computationally expensive parts of training and artificial intelligence, to detect patterns in large and complex data sets. 

And the third is in chemical simulation, where we can use a 

quantum computer to simulate the behavior of molecules and materials, and design new processes around them. Across these three 

33 

applications, the potential value to everyday citizens is immense. 

Now let me give you a concrete example of where this could apply. 

QxBranch recently completed a study into quantum computing applications with Merck, the pharmaceutical company. We worked together to design a quantum algorithm and test it on today’s available hardware, to look at an approach to optimizing the production 

of a particular drug. And the particular drug that they are interested in has an extremely challenging production optimization 

process involved. And quantum computing gave us the tools to look 

at the manufacturing process in an entirely different way that 

could radically change the efficiency of creating this drug and delivering value to the consumer. It is applications such as this that we 

are focused on at QxBranch, breakthroughs enabled by a new approach in computing that allows us to change the way we think 

about business and manufacturing processes. There are some challenges ahead, though, in realizing this technology, and the Federal 

Government can help us create the environment for industry to 

lead. 

The three biggest challenges I would like to highlight today, first 

the skills and workforce. As we have heard, if we are to be successful at bringing quantum computing to market we need a highly 

skilled, multidisciplinary, diverse workforce with core skills in 

quantum information science, computer science, data analytics, machine learning and AI, combined with germane expertise in finance, 

pharmaceuticals, energy and other industries. And we need American universities to send us graduates with these skills. 

The second is in international cooperation. As American companies compete in this emerging ecosystem, we will achieve our fullest success through international cooperation. There is valuable 

scientific research and engineering development that is being made 

elsewhere, including in key allies such as Australia, the U.K., Canada, Japan, and Singapore. We need to be able to access the best 

talent and technology globally and this means partnering. 

There will be national security considerations for this technology, 

of course, but if export restrictions are applied prematurely or 

without your consideration, it will stifle commercial innovation. 

Finally, we need to maximize and leverage private sector investment into this technology area. Over the past 18 months, we have 

seen an incredible acceleration in corporate R&D and venture capital flying into this technology. It is an exciting time, but I must 

stress that we are just at the beginning of this technology development. And the government can maximize and leverage this investment through targeted Federal funding and coordination to reduce 

the gaps and overlaps in R&D and help accelerate technology. 

So in closing, I would like to reiterate my appreciation for the opportunity to join you today and share a little about what we are 

doing at QxBranch and quantum computing. This subcommittee is 

addressing important issues that will help bring quantum computing to commercial reality and give us a powerful, new tool to 

create valuable software. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Brett follows:] 

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Mr. LATTA. Thank you for your testimony. I appreciate all your 

testimony this morning, and that will conclude our witnesses’ testimony this morning, and we will begin our questioning from the 

members. And I will now open with questions with 5 minutes. And 

pardon my allergies this morning, it is this time of year in Washington. 

First, I really appreciated reading your testimony last night, and 

a lot of questions in 5 minutes. But if I could start, Dr. Putman, 

with you, if I may, because I really was interested, so what impact 

does quantum computer have on manufacturing in the United 

States? Because, like, in my district, I have a unique district, I 

have 60,000 manufacturing jobs, and I also have the largest farm 

income producing district in the State of Ohio. And in your opening 

statement, you had mentioned about on the manufacturing side, 

you talked about with drugs and agriculture, energy, and this committee deals a lot with all that, and not really on the agricultural 

side, but I was really interested in that. And I would like to know, 

especially what the impact would be on manufacturing? And also, 

am I correct that it would both create new opportunities while disrupting those existing industries that are out there today? 

Mr. PUTMAN. Thank you, Chairman Latta, my fellow Ohioan. 

This is, of course, extremely personal to me as well, being from 

Ohio and creating and trying to enable manufacturing work. What 

is important, I think, about your question, is that these are brand 

new industries. It is not just about disrupting current industries, 

it has been creating jobs that are for the next generation of technologies. And this is building, I think, interesting jobs as well for 

technologists of the future, and that goes through entire large factories. I mentioned the cost of a fab. It is not just the cost of building a fab, we would like to bring down the cost to build fabs. It is 

the opportunity for workers to be working with the latest of technologies. I think that the Midwest and the rest of the country as 

a whole can only benefit from this. 

Mr. LATTA. Thank you. 

Dr. Monroe, what changes would be needed to ensure America 

has that workforce that is ready for quantum computing revolution? You will be hearing from the witnesses, we have to have that 

workforce out there in the training. So how do we get to that point? 

Do we need on the educational side, especially at the university 

levels, do we need universities that would specialize that in the 

field or what do we need to do? 

Mr. MONROE. Well, thank you for the question, Chairman Latta. 

There are a number of things that we can do as a country to foster 

this gap, this connection between university and government laboratory research and I said, industrial production. At the university 

side, I am sorry to say that most engineering and computer science 

departments haven’t really embraced this field as Dr. Franklin 

mentioned. 

Mr. LATTA. Why? Why not? 

Mr. MONROE. Well, I have my own thoughts on that. Actually my 

daughter is a computer science major at University of Maryland. 

And the computer science departments—the students are keen to 

get a high-paying job right after they graduate. Quantum computing, not that it is not a high paying job, but it is a very speculaVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:19 Feb 08, 2019 Jkt 037690 PO 00000 Frm 00041 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 I:\MY DOCS\HEARINGS 115\HEARINGS\115-131 CHRIS
38 

tive field. And it is hard to identify exactly what the marketplace 

is. And I think—computer science departments and engineering departments, I think, they have not embraced this field as much as 

the sciences have. And I think that is changing at some places. My 

university, the University of Maryland is one of those, Chicago is 

another. There are several across the country that have done that, 

but it is not widespread. Many of these departments won’t hire faculty that are doing research in this field. And I think Dr. Franklin 

mentioned the National Science Foundation is taking an active role 

in trying to change that by instituting new grant programs that 

foster the development of quantum computer science for instance. 

So that is on the university side. On the industry side, it is a 

tough nut to crack, because this new technology as I mentioned involves very exotic type hardware that industry doesn’t have so 

much experience with. And it reminds me of, in history in the 

1950s, when semiconductor devices were being developed and 

scaled, the people who did this over the many decades that gave 

rise to Moore’s law including Gordon Moore, who founded who 

Intel, these were not vacuum tube engineers who had instituted 

the previous generation of computers. So it takes time, and it takes 

risk, and it takes funding from these corporations to do that. 

Mr. LATTA. Well, thank you very much. And my time is about to 

expire, so I am going to yield back and recognize the gentlelady 

from Illinois, the ranking member of the subcommittee, for 5 minutes. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. I am starting to understand the much-used 

phrase taking a quantum leap, because really what you are talking 

about is of all the things that I think we have heard about the 

most disruptive, in a good way, and in a challenging way to the future. And so, I wanted to talk to Dr. Franklin about things I think 

I know more about, which is about education. And I do want to 

hear more about EPIC and the things that you are doing. 

But first, I want to hear about your efforts with younger students in a minute, but I want to first hear about what is happening 

at the graduate and undergraduate level. What I am hearing really 

from all of you is that workforce capacity is really a challenging 

issue. And if we are going to be competitive, and if we are going 

to keep up with countries that are making the EU and also China, 

then we need to get serious about making these public investments. But I am wondering if you can talk to me a little bit about 

the urgent need? 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Yes. So I think Dr. Monroe mentioned that computer science hasn’t had as much quantum in it. And I think it all 

comes back to those funding lapses, because our group and other 

groups started and the way courses get created is that graduate 

students get trained in a field, they go out and become professors, 

create classes and train more students. Those students need to be 

able to have jobs in order to make it worth it for them to take those 

courses. If no Federal funding—if a program gets canceled and you 

are two of six, and all of the Federal funding goes away, and then 

graduate students get put in other fields, you are not going to have 

an education program, and so that is what happened twice is that 

the Federal funding went completely away for the computer science 

39 

portion of quantum computing. And so, groups that were active in 

getting into the field left the field. 

And so now, with this new stack funding and the new EPIC program that we have, and we are planning educational initiatives at 

all levels, including tutorials for professionals, we have a tutorial 

in June and a tutorial in October for professors and graduate students who are already in the field who want to transition to quantum computing. There is an initiative in the institute for molecular 

engineering at UChicago that has an undergraduate degree with a 

quantum track. We are partnering with them to create some computer science to add to that hardware track. And there is a program—— 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Is that the quantum engineering degree that 

you are talking about? 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Yes. There is a quantum track of the molecular 

engineering degree, yes. And they also have a program to embed 

graduate students that are working in all areas of quantum with 

with companies. And so, we are participating in that. So we are 

trying to train other research groups so that they can start doing 

research in quantum. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Given the potential, it seems to me that we 

have to have some sort of almost like a moonshot mentality about 

investment. And you are so right about all kinds of research. If it 

is not steady and consistent, then we either have a brain drain, 

people go elsewhere, or that research app grinds a halt. 

But do tell me a bit about some of the things you are working 

on in the primary and high school level. That is also under your 

bailiwick, too, right? 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Right. So at the elementary and middle school 

level, we are looking at not doing quantum computing per se, but 

computer science in general, because in order to have a quantum 

computer scientist, you need a computer scientist first. And so efforts like CSforALL are critical in getting computer science early 

because in science, anyway, if a student isn’t thinking about becoming a scientist by sixth grade, they are statistically very unlikely 

to become a scientist. And so we believe the same thing may be 

true for computer science. So we want to have those initiatives 

early. 

On the physics side, we are looking at what are the aspects of 

quantum computing that are unintuitive when you get there? And 

one of them is this idea of measurement, Chris Monroe said that 

all the operations work fine until you look at them. And it is an 

issue that the measurement device actually perturbs the state. For 

example, if you had Matchbox cars and you wanted to see how fast 

they were going, you could put your hand out and feel how hard 

it hits your hand. But now that stopped the car. And so this idea 

that your choice of measurement actually affects the system. And 

in quantum computing you have no other choices. For a car you 

could video it and then calculate which one was faster, but we don’t 

have that opportunity in quantum computing. And so those sorts 

of things that are very unintuitive can become intuitive if you just 

give the right examples at young ages. 

Ms. SCHAKOWSKY. Thank you. I am pretty much out of time. I 

yield back. 

40 

Mr. LATTA. Thank you. The gentlelady yields lack. 

The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Illinois, the vice 

chairman of the subcommittee, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. KINZINGER. Well, I thank the chairman for yielding. Thank 

you all for being here. I can understand about 50 percent of the 

things you say, so. 

Mr. Brett, in your testimony you stated that quantum computers 

will allow us to solve some of the most intractable and valuable 

computational problems that exist. Can you explain how doing so 

will benefit everyday Americans? 

Mr. BRETT. Thank you, Congressman. There are some problems 

in computer science that as we add more variables to them, or 

more factors to them, become exponentially more difficult to solve. 

And so that means that the time that is required to solve that 

problem doubles every time we add a new variable to it. And so, 

we can reach a limit of our computational capacity to solve those 

kinds of problems very, very quickly, even with circuit computers 

and cloud computing that is available today. 

So for everyday Americans that are problems like how do we optimize our financial portfolio in our 401(k) where the amount of 

computational work that is required to do that is already immense. 

But if we want to include more factors involved in that and get the 

most efficiency for our portfolio, the scale of computational challenge increases exponentially and so quantum computing can help 

with that. We can take on more complex and more difficult problems and solve them in a much shorter time with a new type of 

machine. 

Mr. KINZINGER. OK. Now I am going to be honest Dr. Putman, 

I really don’t know what I am going to say here, so I am going to 

say it and hopefully you understand the question. OK. 

When you measure a qubit, it immediately changes its value to 

either a solid one or zero. So as I understand, which I don’t, to manipulate a quantum computer, the operator needs to be able to 

make measurements indirectly without a qubit observing you doing 

so. How do you do that? And how does that match the capabilities 

of classic electronic computers and processors with billions of transistors? 

Mr. PUTMAN. This is one I feel like I should have one of the 

quantum computing experts answer. This is something that occurs 

in physics that has been measured for many, many years. So how 

it is implemented becomes our greatest challenge, and there are 

several different ways to do it. Generally, you want to be in a situation where you control the atmosphere. While it is observable in 

nature, it is not as controllable as dealing with information series 

stringing of zeros and ones which just adds up in sums. I think I 

would like to have someone else explain the actual technology of 

how it might work. Dr. Monroe? 

Mr. MONROE. Sure. First I would like to add that you are in good 

company because Albert Einstein never accepted quantum mechanics. He didn’t think it was complete. 

Mr. KINZINGER. So I am basically like Albert Einstein. Thank 

you, sir. I agree. 

Mr. MONROE. Analogies do wonders in all of science, especially 

in quantum mechanics. I agree with Dr. Franklin’s statement that 

41 

finding analogies, you can teach the concepts to young children in 

elementary school. I totally believe that. 

Here is an analogy for a qubit. It is a coin, imagine a coin, when 

we flip a coin, it is in a definite state all the time, but we might 

not know what it is or want to know all the details, but if you 

think of a coin as being quantum in, say, both heads and tails at 

the same time. Imagine now it is in a black box and you are not 

looking at it, so it is both heads and tails at the same time, but 

I want to control that coin, I want to maybe flip it. Let’s say it is 

a weighted coin, so it is 90 percent heads and 10 percent tails. I 

want to flip the odds to be 90 percent tails and 10 percent heads. 

Well, we can do this from the outside world by just turning the box 

around, in a sense. 

Mr. KINZINGER. Actually, that makes sense. 

Mr. MONROE. So we don’t know what the state was, we didn’t 

measure it, we didn’t betray the quantum system but we controlled 

it. And so to Dr. Putman’s point, this is pretty exotic hardware, because the quantum stuff is inside and we have to keep our distance 

when we control it. We have to do things without looking and put 

quotes. What it means is that the system is so extremely well isolated that we don’t get the information out. So a quantum computation involves manipulations like that. They can be much more 

complicated. Flip one qubit depending on the state of another, for 

instance, without looking—and it is possible to do that in a very 

small group set of technologies. Then at the end of the day, you 

unveil, you open the box, and you measure only one state, but it 

could be lots and lots of bits and that one answer could depend on 

exponentially many paths, exponentially many inputs in the device. 

As Mr. Brett mentioned, this can be put to use for real world problems, and logistics, and so forth. 

Mr. KINZINGER. Awesome. Well, thanks. Nice work. I yield back. 

Mr. LATTA. That is a large statue of Albert Einstein down the 

street, Mr. Vice Chairman, in front of the State Department. So 

you might get your statue there some time. 

The chair recognizes the gentleman from Kentucky for 5 minutes. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. Thank you very much. 

That was a good example. I am trying to understand this and 

move it forward. This is kind of in my family. I didn’t get any of 

the genetics, but have a nephew at the University Chicago in the 

physics department going to CERN this summer. So he is in a different league than I am. So some of the discussion we hear is like 

he and my son talking to each other during Thanksgiving or whatever, he is a computer science and math person as well, working 

in Chicago, but in the financial industry. 

So I guess I am trying to figure out, or take in the theory, not 

really theory but the things that you are talking about that is hard 

to understand and make it to the real world. 

So first, Mr. Brett, I will go to you. Can you tell us a little bit 

about what your company is doing in the financial services area? 

That is where my son is in, in algorithms. He is in one of the quant 

guys, I guess, in hedge funds, but how quantum computing would 

be an improvement over classical computing. What difference does 

42 

this make, I guess? And what is your firm doing in financial services to be better than what is currently there? 

Mr. BRETT. Thank you, Congressman. The financial services sector is already a huge user of cloud compute technology. So they are 

using immense amounts of computational work, either on public 

clouds, like AWS or Microsoft, or their own private service. And it 

is important to understand that quantum computers won’t replace 

classical computers. They will exist side by side in the cloud. And 

quantum computers will run some the algorithms that they are 

most efficient at. So in a mixed compute environment of financial 

services company will run their daily operation around compliance, 

portfolio, optimization, understanding risks, but send some of the 

algorithms that are in the program to the quantum computer to be 

most efficiently run. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. So what does that do different? In what way? How 

is that? 

Mr. BRETT. So a quantum computer cannot allow us to solve 

some particular algorithms that cannot be solved on a classical machine in a useful timeframe. So we might be able to solve it over 

many, many years, or decades even, but what if we need the answer today? A quantum computer can help give us that speed advantage. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. So why wouldn’t it completely replace the classical 

update if it gets to that? 

Mr. BRETT. It is too expensive, and also, there are some problems 

that quantum computers can’t do. So quantum computers aren’t 

particularly good, for example, at addition or subtraction, so we 

leave those to classical computers to do that work, and quantum 

computers specialize in what they are good at, which is optimization problems. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. OK. This is a little harder for my mental capacity 

to understand something that can’t do math, but can do other 

things, but simple math, I guess. So I am at addition subtraction 

level. I am not an Einstein like my friend, Mr. Kinzinger. 

So Dr. Putman, in your testimony—I am trying to get back to reality—you did find the problem scarcity as one that quantum computing could help solve. And how might quantum computing disrupt traditional models of how resources are created and distributed in an economy? 

Mr. PUTMAN. Thank you, Congressman. 

Often, there is an enormous amount of waste in the way that we 

currently produce anything. This is not due to humans caring to 

produce waste, or a problem with this in general, it is due to our 

inability to comprehend and to simulate and to build. The more 

precise we are on a molecular level, the better we are at being able 

to do that. The examples that I used such as fertilizer, for instance, 

or of material science, a classical computer gets very rough examples of how to actually build something and understand what is 

going on molecularly. The more we are able to do that in ways that 

quantum computing allows, the more we can explore the space of 

possibilities. When we explore that space and understand it, it 

gives us a chance to create it. This just is not possible with humans 

alone, or with our classic computing systems. This applies to many 

areas that we could go on about. 

43 

Mr. GUTHRIE. OK. 

Mr. PUTMAN. But certainly in manufacturing, it creates an entirely different way of doing manufacturing when we are precise. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. OK. When we are doing votes in the cloakroom, I 

am going to let Adam further explain this to me. So I am willing 

to do that moving forward. Thanks. 

I understand it is just such a difficult concept for people not in 

your space to understand, but it is exciting stuff. I have about 30 

seconds. But Dr. Monroe, I know Dr. Putman mentioned about 

qubits, how many in quantum computers. But here is a question, 

is what is the signal-to-noise ratio per qubits? For which I mean, 

how many qubits does one need for a useful quantum computer? 

And of those, how many would actually be performing calculations? 

Mr. MONROE. Ah, thank you for the question. I probably won’t 

answer it to your liking. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. To my understanding. Probably to my liking, just 

not to my understanding. 

Mr. MONROE. We don’t know yet how many qubits are needed for 

something useful that can displace conventional computers. However, a relatively small number of about 75 or 100 qubits is enough 

to show certain, very esoteric and narrow, maybe not useful, problems can be solved that cannot be solved using conventional computers. That doesn’t mean they are useful. And so it is sort of a 

proof of principle, and that is going to happen very soon. But then 

the question after that happens, once we are beyond that milepost, 

the idea is to find something useful. And I think the only way to 

find something useful is to put these devices in the hands of people 

that don’t know or care what is inside the devices, sort of like my 

smartphone. I don’t really want to know what is inside. And to 

build these devices, I use the word ‘‘exotic’’ a lot; it is exotic hardware to build these devices. It takes a new generation of engineers. 

And it may be that we need hundreds, it may be that we need 

thousands or more of these qubits for something useful. 

Mr. GUTHRIE. Thank you. I yield back. 

Mr. LATTA. Thank you. The gentleman yields back. The chair recognizes the gentleman from Massachusetts for 5 minutes. 

Mr. KENNEDY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for calling 

this important hearing. Thank you to our panelists today for being 

here. From what I can tell, all of you clearly believe in the future 

of quantum computing, that is great. Still, there are some very 

smart people out there who are skeptical that quantum computing 

won’t ever become a practical reality. They say for instance that 

quantum computers are too unstable and error-prone to be harnessed for real world problem-solving. 

Dr. Franklin, and anybody else who wants to comment on this, 

how do you respond to those skeptics? And what do you see as the 

biggest hurdles to a real world application for quantum computing? 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Well, I think that if we made decisions based on 

that assumption then we clearly won’t build a quantum computer. 

And if we are wrong, the stakes are far too high, because other 

countries will make one, and then they will be able to decrypt all 

of the messages—there are so many advantages, if it can be realized, that we don’t want to be the ones who decide early and then 

are wrong. And we are making great strides. 

44 

Yes, right now, quantum computers are very small and very 

error-prone. And so physicists like Dr. Monroe are working on making them more stable, larger, longer running. And then there is the 

piece in between. It used to be that classical computers were very 

large in size, but very few bits and couldn’t do very much. What 

we could do in the 1980s in supercomputers is on your smartphone 

now. And so we don’t know what can be done, and we need to put 

the resources in to see where we can go, because the stakes are 

just too high. 

Mr. KENNEDY. Dr. Monroe. 

Mr. MONROE. I would add on to that, I think, the question the 

same technology we used to build quantum computers is also used 

for quantum communication and quantum sensors. And these are 

real-world applications that can be and are deployed right now. 

On the sensor side, the ability to detect signals remotely, the optical techniques, or to detect mass, which means if you are underwater, you need to know where you are to navigate. If you are exploring for oil, you need to know what is underneath the rock. Is 

it oil? Is it water? Those sensors, the limiting signal to noise in 

those sensors is given by quantum mechanics, we actually exceed 

those seemingly fundamental limits, in some cases. I mention this 

because that same type of technology is used in quantum computers. I do believe that quantum computers are most disruptive 

of all these technologies, but along the path toward that, there will 

be other spinoffs. 

Quantum communication is largely photonic, optics as we communicate now over long distance. You can also do this with single 

particles of light, photons. And photons can—these are wonderful 

quantum bits that can be used for quantum computing in some 

cases, but they can also be used to send data in ways that are 

hack-proof. If somebody tries to observe it, they change it, they can 

cut the line always, they destroy your communication, but they 

can’t intercept it and understand it. So what does that have to do 

with quantum computing? If you are going to build a big quantum 

computer, it is going to be a network. It is going to have optics that 

fiberize little modules on a computer. None of this hardware really 

exists today to couple those photons to quantum memories in 

qubits. I would hang my hat on quantum computing being the most 

disruptive of all of them, but along the way many other technologies related. 

Mr. KENNEDY. Dr. Franklin, you started to get into something 

that I wanted to ask—have got about 1 minute and 15 seconds left 

or so—encryption and the application of quantum computing to 

encryption and the potential for it to render in encryption obsolete. 

Can you talk me through that and what is the reality of that? 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Yes, so encryption is all based on the idea that 

doing one operation is much harder than undoing it. It is a lot easier to multiply two numbers than it is to divide or factor a number. 

And so there is a quantum computing algorithm that actually takes 

a lot this and so that is not one of the near-term applications, but 

that makes it so that factoring the very numbers that are used to 

create those keys that are required to encrypt and decrypt, can be 

broken down very easily to their components, and their components 

are necessary to decrypt. And so if we get a quantum computer of 

45 

that size, we are going to have to figure out completely new 

encryption algorithms that use mathematical functions that a 

quantum computer cannot do quickly. 

Mr. KENNEDY. And is that time horizon, can you put a time horizon that actually takes a lot on that. 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Chris? 

Mr. MONROE. So this factoring problem, it is among the hardest 

out of there. You probably need tens of thousands of qubits, quanta 

bits and millions, or more, maybe even billions of operations. I will 

say, however, the problem is so important that you need to know— 

you don’t want a quantum computer just to break messages. You 

want to know when one exists, that impacts how you encrypt now. 

We are talking political time scale, so if a computer exists in 30 

years, that could impact how you encrypt things now, so you may 

want to be ahead of the game and change the encryption standards 

based on when a quantum computer will exists, and it is very, very 

hard to predict 30 years in the future what technology will bring 

us. 

Mr. KENNEDY. If you can predict what is going to happen tomorrow, we should hang out more. Thanks very much. I yield back. 

Mr. LATTA. The gentleman yields back. The chair recognizes the 

gentleman from Florida for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate it. I will be as brief as I can to get everyone else in. 

Mr. Brett, in your testimony, you identify three classes of applications that are possible in the near term, and I know you talked 

about these earlier. 

Can you briefly explain why you expect those to be the most possible in the near term? 

Mr. BRETT. Thank you for the question, Congressman. 

With the earliest quantum computers, like the type that Chris 

Monroe is building at the moment, the first versions of these won’t 

have error correction on them. And so the kind of applications that 

we can build need to able to accommodate errors and the potential 

imprecisions that come along with that. And so the kind of applications that are best suited to early stage quantum computers are 

those which are the most tolerant or resilient to error. And those 

are things like optimization problems, working with chemical simulation and machine-learning-type problems because the kind of algorithms we run on there are based on probabilities. And so we already get a probabilistic-type answer from classical computers out 

of that, and a quantum computer best matches what is possible 

there. 

So the early stage applications are those that are more probabilistic, more resilient to error. And then, as the computers become more capable and better, we will be able to take on the harder type problems that require error correction around that. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. OK. Thank you. 

This next question is for the panel. Will quantum computers be 

something that anyone can use, which is important, or will it require a highly sensitive operating environment, such as that only 

a handful would be able to operate? 

Why don’t we start from over here, from afar, please. 

Mr. PUTNAM. Thank you, Congressman. 

46 

It has to be something that has user interfaces that are possible 

for everyone in order for it to be incredibly relevant. The physics 

and the hardware behind it, just like the hardware and the physics 

behind everything else we do, will have a lot of specialists involved 

with it. But it is important for us, it is a challenge and important 

for us that this is something that is in the hands of anybody. 

So I think absolutely. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. So it is not going to require additional training or 

anything like that—— 

Mr. PUTNAM. Well, only to the extent that everything we do requires some amount of training until it becomes so commonplace 

that it becomes natural. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. All right. Very good. 

If you could comment on that, please. 

Mr. MONROE. Sure. Thank you for the question. I will be very 

brief. 

I think the answer is it will be very much like current computers. The use of current computers to program in certain languages takes some training. It will be a different type of a language. 

But the fact that there are individual atoms in the device at the 

end of the wire will be lost on the user, and it should be. They don’t 

need to know that. They need to know the rules, the programming 

language, and what it can solve. 

So I think the answer will be affirmative. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. Very good. 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Yes. I think there are sort of three levels. One is 

the hardware. We are seeing quantum cloud computation, so I 

think it is likely that you won’t buy one and maybe have it in your 

pocket. But at least the cloud resources will be there. 

And as a user, you may not even know that you are using a 

quantum algorithm. The services that you use will have programmers who have made a combination of quantum algorithms and 

classical algorithms and send that computation to the cloud. When 

you do a Google search, something like a hundred programs respond off for that one search to figure out, is it an airline, is it a 

mathematical—all these different things. 

In terms of the ability to program it, that is where the most work 

has to come in. Right now, the amount of expertise needed to program these is insane. It is a high level of expertise. But that is how 

it was when the first women programmers were given a spec of the 

first computer and said, ‘‘Here. Program this,’’ right? 

They did it from the hardware. That is essential where we are. 

It is very tied to the hardware. So we need to figure out what are 

those abstractions that are still useful computingwise but also understandable to people who are the current level of a traditional 

computer scientist or even an application developer. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. OK. Very good. 

Please. 

Mr. BRETT. Thank you for the question. 

I fully agree with my fellow panelists that we believe that you 

shouldn’t need to have a degree in quantum physics to program a 

quantum computer. And so that is exactly what we are doing at 

QxBranch, is building the software that enables regular software 

47 

engineers and computer scientists to create applications and to do 

so without needing to know the intricacies of what exactly is happening down at the molecular scale. 

I will also point out that quantum computing is already becoming 

accessible. So, in the cloud today, IBM, for example, have released 

a quantum computer that we can all access. It is at IBM.com/quantum. We can go there this afternoon, do a short course on quantum 

computing programming, and start to build up that knowledge and 

understanding of what is possible and start to build those skills for 

the future. 

Mr. BILIRAKIS. All right. Very good. 

I yield back, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate it. 

Mr. LATTA. Thank you. The gentleman yields back. 

And the chair now recognizes the gentleman from West Virginia 

for 5 minutes. 

Mr. MCKINLEY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And, again, thank you for continuing to put before us in our 

hearings some very provocative thoughts and through this disrupter series. We have dealt with, over the past 2 years, some very 

curious and innovative and, for me, as one of two engineers in Congress, exciting possibilities where we might go with this. So I am 

fascinated with it, but I am also—I am sorry that the other side 

of the aisle didn’t show up today. But I was curious to hear more 

of what Kennedy was talking about, the skepticism, because when 

I looked a little into that, there is some skepticism. And one of the 

articles I was reading a couple days ago had to do with reliability 

of the results. 

So I know from doing my own engineering calculation that we 

can—at the end of the day, we know whether that result makes 

sense. But what happens when we use quantum computing if we 

get—and I think, Monroe, I think you might have said if they are 

error prone, do we rely on the result? How do we question it? If 

we are relying on our computers to give us the answer and then 

we get the answer, how do we know it is wrong? Or how do we 

know it is right because of all the variables that you have all 

talked about here? 

Do you want to answer that? 

Mr. MONROE. Yes. Thank you for the question. A very good one. 

I think it speaks to the—so far, the limited research of what a 

quantum computer is useful for. There exist problems, like the factoring problem; you can easily check it. Fifteen is equal to five 

times three. When that 15 is a huge number, you can’t do it using 

regular computers, but you can multiply your answer together to 

check and see if it worked. 

Mr. MCKINLEY. Talk about encryption. 

Mr. MONROE. Yes. If you can factor large numbers, you can break 

the popular types of encryption algorithms out there now. And if 

you think you have a code breaker, you can check it quickly. 

And so almost all applications of quantum computers, they are 

either checkable against some standard, or they could be better 

than any classical approach. Say, for instance, in the financial market or some logistics problem where there is a cost function, it is 

in real dollars, and you are trying to minimize the cost subject to 

48 

an uncountable number of constraints and configurations of the 

marketplace, for instance. 

Well, if your quantum computer comes up with a result that has 

lower costs than any conventional computer could compute, then 

you found a different solution. 

Mr. MCKINLEY. OK. A couple quick points here to follow back up. 

I can see there is a lot more—again, fascinating. I want to read 

more. This whole idea has triggered me to do a little bit more research in this as well. 

But let’s talk about the timetables. Right now, yes, some elementary units are out there. But what is the metric? Where is the goal? 

Where do we want to achieve? And how do we know whether we 

are there? And, secondly with that, what is the role of Congress on 

this? 

Is this just more money into research? You talk about building 

plants or facilities so that we could build these qubits? Is this what 

it is? What role is government? 

Mr. MONROE. Well, thank you for the question. 

Again, I mentioned the idea of a national quantum initiative and 

the crux of that initiative is to establish, indeed, a small number 

of hub laboratories. They are not new buildings. 

Mr. MCKINLEY. These are hub zones or hub lab—yes. 

Mr. MONROE. Yes. Quantum innovation laboratories. They could 

be at existing university, Department of Energy, or Department of 

Defense laboratories, collaborations with industry, hubs where students and industrial players are all in the same sandpit. 

And each of these hubs—there will be a small number of them— 

they would focus on a very particular aspect of quantum information or sensing or quantum computing. Maybe develop particular 

brand of qubit, for instance. 

And the point here is to foster the generation, a new generation, 

of engineers in that particular technology. Industry will be able to 

connect more vitally with the university and a potential workforce. 

Students could have —— 

Mr. MCKINLEY. Are we trying to develop a standard qubit? 

Mr. MONROE. I think it is too early to do that now. I think we 

have several different technologies, and they will probably all find 

different uses. Sort of like now we have a CPU on a computer. We 

have memory. There are all kinds of different components, different 

hardwares that are good for different things. And we will probably 

see that in quantum as well. 

Mr. MCKINLEY. OK. Again, what is the timetable? 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Well, I think it depends on the application. 

Encryption might be 30 years off. But we have got 50 qubit machines now that are growing. And so these near-term applications, 

like optimization, are on the horizon, maybe 5 years. The hardware 

is coming along very quickly. I think that—and some software, but 

this is the first I have heard of a software company. I am very excited. 

But that middleware. There is software that needs to be created 

that makes it so that algorithms that assume perfect hardware can 

be modified to use this near-term hardware so that we don’t have 

to wait as long and can help close that gap between the assumptions of the software and the realities of the hardware. 

49 

Dr. MCKINLEY. OK. Thank you. 

I yield back. 

Mr. LATTA. Thank you. The gentleman yields back. And the chair 

recognizes the gentleman from Indiana for 5 minutes. 

Mr. BUCSHON. Well, thank you for being here. It is a fascinating 

subject. I was a surgeon before, so I am kind of a scientist. I am 

interested in this. My daughter is sophomore at Cornell in computer science. So she is, obviously. 

I am going to take a little different pathway here on questioning 

and stay away from the technical stuff and go toward research 

funding. And I was on a committee before that had jurisdiction 

over National Science Foundation. I am from Indiana. I went to all 

the universities and talked to the NSF funded researchers. And the 

one thing that I found is—first of all, I support that, right? I am 

a big supporter of research. One thing I found is, if I said, ‘‘Hey, 

tell me why what you are doing should continue to get funding 

from the National Science Foundation.’’ Just a simple question, 

right? I found probably 90 percent of the people that I spoke to 

couldn’t, in a really tight way, explain that. And for me, they can 

explain it in complex way. And I am like, ‘‘Oh, yes. I get it.’’ 

But people like me have to explain this to 700,000 people that 

we represent in a way that if we are going to justify Federal dollars 

and taxpayer dollars, we have to be able to give a so-called elevator 

speech and say—and one example, I think this is 4 or 5 years ago 

that was kind of in the press was about a funded researcher—and 

this is not a criticism—that was having seniors play video games. 

And so it got in the press, and people said, ‘‘Well, why would you 

fund that?’’ 

Well, as it turns out, it was Alzheimer’s research. You see what 

I am saying? And very valid, very important research. But to try 

to explain that, when it is written in a line, government funds 

video game; having people be better video game players doesn’t 

play very well, and so people like me have a hard time explaining 

that. 

So I guess what I am getting at is—and I guess this will be primarily for the people from the universities—is what is your pitch 

for more funding for quantum computing? That is something, you 

have already explained it to me, and I get it. But if we are going 

to explain it to the broader Members of Congress and our constituents, how do we explain that, why we should do that? 

Does that make sense? 

Mr. MONROE. Yes, it does. Thank you for the question, Congressman. 

Yes. I did speak at length about these very targeted type hubs. 

And it should be sort of self-evident what these are about. They are 

developing technology. They are more technology centers. 

But there must be an undercurrent of foundational research, and 

this is something the National Science Foundation, they are a very 

special agency in that regard. Fundamental research is very inefficient, and we can never tell what is around the corner. And you 

can never predict what is going to hit and what—— 

Mr. BUCSHON. Yes. You don’t know what you don’t know, right? 

Mr. MONROE. Yes. That is right. 

50 

And as the Science Foundation takes all-comers and they will 

have to play an important role in any national quantum initiative 

in the future, because there may be quantum technologies that 

don’t exist now. And maybe in 10 years, due to some surprise and 

some weirdo material, we see that, oh, they behave as wonderful 

qubits. 

So, again, it is too bad that it is inefficient, but the home runs 

are far reaching, and this field will probably rely on those in the 

coming decades. 

Mr. BUCSHON. Dr. Franklin. 

Ms. FRANKLIN. Yes. It depends on how long you are in the elevator. I think the pitch for quantum computers starts with the killer 

apps of drug design for Alzheimer’s, right? It is projected that 40 

percent of the Medicaid budget is going to go toward Alzheimer’s 

by 2040. 

So, these are real problems. And if we could model the molecules 

and figure out exactly how nitrogen gets fixed and put into fertilizer, we could have much lower energy, food production. And so 

these are big deals, right? And those are things that can’t be done 

with classical computing. 

Then the next step is you have to tie the researchers to those 

problems. And that is what sometimes researchers aren’t good at 

conveying. But that is why I do think that the calls—we are at the 

cusp of commercialization, and it might be an appropriate time for 

even the NSF funding to be looking at the broader impacts more. 

So our group is making tools that everyone can use, and so that 

is something that we can hang on to, right? 

Mr. BUCSHON. OK. The other thing I am interested in is technology transfer, obviously, because that is, as you know, a huge 

problem, not only in this area but across the research fields. What 

percentage of research goes, that is probably potentially commercially useful. It just goes into a black hole. 

And I know I am short on time, but maybe, Mr. Brett, you can 

comment, how we can do better on technology transfer because it 

is a pretty big problem, really. 

Mr. BRETT. Thank you, Congressman. 

And we agree. As a small business that is looking to commercialize some of these innovations, how do we get access to some of 

the great work that is being done at the universities and to incorporate that? 

Mr. BUCSHON. Because it is proprietary, right, sometimes? That 

is some of the problem maybe, right? People are willing—if they 

put the research out there, they are worried somebody will steal it, 

so to speak, right? 

Mr. BRETT. An approach that has been particularly successful for 

us is being able to partner with universities on research grants and 

so for—as an R&D business to also participate in the collaboration 

of that research and contribute to the science and the publication 

around that and share some of that intellectual property on a joint 

project together. And I think that that cross between the commercial sector and the research sector working together on funded proposals will enable a lot of that technology transfer. 

Mr. BUCSHON. OK. My time is up. 

I yield back. 

51 

Mr. LATTA. Well, the gentleman yields back. 

And I first want to thank our panel for being here today. One 

of the great things about serving on this committee and because we 

do have such wide jurisdiction, I always say it is like looking over 

the horizon 5 to 10 years, that we hear it here first. And we want 

to make sure that our nation is on that cutting edge. 

And I am going to say something about some of our folks that 

were asking questions. They were a little bit on the modest side. 

I have a former Air Force pilot, a West Point grad, an engineer, 

and cardiothoracic surgeon over here. So they are not limited in 

knowledge. 

But what you gave us today was very, very informative because, 

again, we have to make sure that, as we go forward as a committee, that we are making the right decisions as we go on. 

And the gentlelady also would like to make a comment too. So 

I just want to thank you all. But I will finish up the ending, but 

I will let the gentlelady right now. 

Ms. SCHAKOWKSY. Thank you. China is building a $10 billion quantum lab right now. And they expect to be finished by 2020. And the EU is investing about $2 

billion in advanced quantum technology. So I think one of the answers in terms of why we should be serious about making investments may be decryption is—and encryption is—some decades 

away. But from a national security perspective, I think that there 

are a lot of reasons that we should take this seriously and make 

the investments. And, of course, all the practical things about agriculture and pharmaceuticals, et cetera, is very, very important, disease cures. 

But it seems to me that, despite maybe some skepticism, there 

is enough evidence right now that really ought to be an important 

priority. So I just want to thank you very much. You really did enlighten me. 

Thank you. 

Mr. LATTA. Thank you. The gentlelady yields back. 

And seeing that we have no further members that are going to 

be asking questions today, pursuant to committee rules, I remind 

members that they have 10 business days to submit additional 

questions for the record. And I ask that witnesses submit their responses within 10 business days upon receipt of questions. 

And, without objection, the subcommittee will stand adjourned. 

Thank you very much for attending today. 

[Whereupon, at 10:34 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

[Material submitted for inclusion in the record follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. GREG WALDEN

Good morning and thank you to our witnesses for appearing before the subcommittee today to discuss quantum computing and your work in the field. Part of 

our job at the Energy and Commerce Committee is to explore ideas and issues that 

have the potential to radically alter the way Americans work and live. 

Our Disrupter Series allows us to spotlight the emerging technologies that might 

one day fundamentally change the status quo. Quantum computing is just one such 

innovation that is still on the cutting edge of development. 

Quantum computers could one day revolutionize materials simulation, data analysis, medicine, machine learning, communications, and countless other fields. At the 

same time, challenges remain to the development of quantum computers because of 

their complex and unique operational needs. 

52 

1https://edgylabs.com/lsu-receives-federal-grant-to-develop-quantum-technologies. 

Nevertheless, the race is on and the stakes are high. The U.S. is locked in competition with China, Russia, and Europe to develop a practical and commercially 

available quantum computer. 

Research into this promising technology is happening across the country. America’s universities are leading the way, with advanced research taking place at dozens of institutions nationwide. 

One such effort is at my alma mater, the University of Oregon, where Nobel-prize 

winning physicist David Wineland and other members of the physics department 

are wrestling with this complex project. Just last month it was announced that researchers from U of O, along with those from Duke, UC Berkley, MIT, Johns Hopkins, and others, have received funding from the U.S. Army Reserve Office to help 

develop quantum technologies. 1

The mind-bending ideas inherent to the physics of quantum computing are difficult to grasp. 

Particles that exist in multiple states simultaneously—light and matter existing 

as both particle and wave; entangled atoms that can share their physical connection 

even when separated across the universe —these are complicated topics. As the 

great Danish physicist Niels Bohr has been quoted as saying, ‘‘Anyone who is not 

shocked by quantum theory has not understood it.’’ 

This makes it all the more remarkable that efforts to harness these principles for 

widespread use are well underway. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses 

about how far we have come in developing a practical quantum computer, and how 

far we have yet to go. 

The experts before us today will help the committee gain a better understanding 

of the complicated physics that underlie these efforts, and how important it is that 

America remains at the forefront of this innovation. 

The entrepreneurial spirit of the United States has no equal. Here at the Energy 

and Commerce Committee, it is our goal to support U.S. innovation and the jobs 

and economic growth produced as a result. Every day, American innovators accomplish things that were previously thought unimaginable. 

I thank the witnesses for your time today, and the important work you are doing. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back the balance of my time. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK PALLONE, JR. 

I do not pretend to understand some of the concepts at the core of quantum computing. It is reassuring to me that even Einstein struggled with these ideas. 

Fortunately, I do not need to be an expert to understand that quantum computers 

may someday be able to perform calculations far beyond the capacity of even the 

fastest supercomputers. I also appreciate that these computers have great potential 

to solve many now- unsolvable real world problems. 

The development of life-saving drugs is just one example. Today, new drug development takes years, produces many false leads, and costs billions of dollars. A quantum computer could be used to predict how molecules, proteins, and chemicals interact with each other and with human cells. The result: safer more effective drugs, 

for treating Alzheimer’s, cancer, or opioid addiction, get to market sooner and at 

more affordable prices. 

The technology has many other promising applications for agriculture, climate 

study, financial analysis, supply chain management, traffic control, and more. 

At the same time, quantum computing could open a Pandora’s Box for security, 

rendering all modern encryption obsolete. In theory, a quantum computer could 

someday crack codes in mere seconds that would take a traditional computer thousands of years to decipher. That milestone would completely change the global balance of power. 

I am looking forward to learning more from our panelists about just how theoretical these applications are, and how long it will take for them to become a reality. 

Despite dramatic progress in the past two or three years, there are still major hurdles to overcome before fully functional quantum computers are solving real-world 

problems. 

We may not know with certainty when quantum computing will be a reality. We 

may not be able to predict all of its potential uses. We can, however, identify and 

address current obstacles to progress. Two clear obstacles are funding and workforce 

training. 

53 

The federal government must support quantum computing research as well as 

basic scientific research. And those dollars must be continuous and predictable. 

We also must be mindful that other countries are investing heavily in quantum 

computing and we must stay globally competitive. China, for instance, is building 

a 10 billion-dollar national lab by 2020, and the European Union plans to invest 

two billion euros over the next 10 years. 

People are just as essential as dollars, but right now there is a profound gap in 

education and training. The field needs more computer scientists, mathematicians, 

and engineers with a solid grasp of quantum mechanics. Undergraduate and graduate programs that combine these disciplines, however, are rare. And students of 

all ages must be exposed to the principles of quantum computing from an early age 

all the way through graduate programs. We are fortunate to have Professor Diana 

Franklin here today to speak to the education and training gaps. Mr. Chairman, I 

look forward to hearing from her and all of our witnesses. 

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