IT4Innovations introduces a novelty in quantum computing on the Karolina and Barbora supercomputers: the CUDA Quantum simulator. This tool simplifies the development of hybrid applications and significantly increases quantum computing productivity and scalability. It allows 30 qubits to be simulated on a single GPU of the Karolina supercomputer and is available to all IT4Innovations users running an active project.
The CUDA Quantum simulator offers a unified programming model that allows CPU, GPU, and QPU to work together. Currently, QPU computations are simulated on supercomputer GPUs. The simulator allows programming tasks in Python, and installation is user-friendly thanks to the use of the Conda environment. Detailed instructions are available here.
Silvie Illésová from the IT4Innovations Quantum Computing Lab explains: “The simulator is relatively easy to start. Once installed, the documentation contains an example that anyone can try out. The simulator can be used by anyone who has an active computing project on IT4Innovations supercomputers. Our team simulated 30 qubits on 1 GPU of the Karolina supercomputer without much optimisation.”
Illésová adds: “The quantum simulator is widely used because current quantum computers are not yet suitable for proof-of-concept of new algorithms. By simulating QPUs on GPU cards, this simulator is ideal for tasks with a larger number of qubits and for hybrid algorithms combining classical HPC and quantum computing.”
A tutorial is available for those who would like to try out the quantum simulator.