How to get started in Quantum Computing?

This blog is written for people to get started in the field of Quantum Computing. If you don't know what is Quantum Computing then this blog is highly recommended 

If you are searching for visual content then this video might help you. 

How to start?

As you know that Quantum Computing is an interdisciplinary subject that itself has many sub-branches like Quantum Machine Learning, Quantum Chemistry, Quantum Cryptography, etc. So it has many prerequisites depending on how much deep you want to go in this field. 

Prerequisites for basic level 

Python: You need to learn some programming fundamentals before starting if you don't know any programming language then starting with python will be a good decision. If you are familiar with a language other than python then believe me you won't find any difficulty in learning python as it's all a matter of syntax for you. If you are familiar with Jupyter notebooks then it's good if you are not then it's no big deal, you can learn that on the go. 

Learning resource: There are many resources available online for learning python, If you already know programming fundamentals then this website will help in syntax and all.  

Linear Algebra: You need to know certain maths as it's Quantum Mechanics After all. Linear Algebra is the language of Quantum Computing.  You need to learn college-level Linear Algebra as it is needed to understand the theory behind the working of Quantum Circuits, especially bra ket notations, tensor products, and complex analysis.

Learning resource: You can Learn from any book you like but personally I find 3b1b Youtube video series helpful for visualising things and Khan academy course to be useful for theory 

There are so many companies who are behind Quantum Supremacy like IBM, Microsoft, Google, Amazon. So they all have their way of doing Quantum Computing. There are many companies that are specifically focused in this field like DWave and Xanadu.

IBM uses Qiskit (Python Library) for doing their experiments. It has great content to learn. It has a youtube channel where there are so many tutorials given on how to use Qiskit. It also has an online textbook that has nearly all the tutorials needed to get into Quantum Computing. It also conducted some events like Quantum Global Summer School all the lectures of the events are given here.

There are other players in this field and they all have their way of doing Quantum Computing. Pennylane is a company that is specially focused on QML(Quantum Machine Learning). If anyone is interested in this field then try this out.

There are some open-source organizations like QOSF(Quantum Open Source Foundation) which is also great for learning purposes. Most of the tools that are used in Quantum Computing are Open-source. If you know how to contribute to open-source through Github then it is recommended to do some contributions as they always give more preference to their contributors.  Most of them have their slack workspace for asking doubts. If you find difficulties in any concepts, if you want to know how to use any specific thing in any software package then you can ask all these things in their slack workspace.

That's all for experiments and stuff but what about theory. If you don't know any theory then all things are a complete waste. There are some books and lecture series that are highly recommended to understand the theory.

1. Quantum Computation and Quantum Information, Book by Isaac Chuang and Michael Nielsen

2. Quantum Computing for Computer Scientists, Book by Mirco A. Mannucci and Noson S. Yanofsky

3. Quantum Computer Science, Book by N. David Mermin

These Books are Good books for Reference and Reading.You can easily find pdf of these books on the internet.

There are some Youtube Lecture series that are good for Understanding theory.  

1. Quantum Machine Learning MOOC, created by Peter Wittek from the University of Toronto in Spring 2019. 

2. Quantum Mechanics and Quantum Computation by Umesh Vazirani (Coursera 2012)

3. Quantum Computing by Prof. Debabrata Goswami | IIT Kanpur(NPTEL)

Of course, there are many other Resources available for Quantum Computing but the above-suggested ones are standard ones. If these things don't suit you then you are free to choose other Resources.

Learn By Doing

You don’t need to master python, Linear algebra, or Quantum Mechanics to run a Quantum Circuit on Quantum Computer. There are two sides, Theoretical and Experimental You can learn both parallelly. This way of learning is widely accepted and used in the case of Quantum Computing. Learning a New algorithm and trying it out in Quantum Computer is the standard

 way of learning Quantum Computing

Participate in Hackathons/Seminars/Conference

After you have reached a certain level of Quantum Computing then start participating in hackathons. Hackathons are a great way of learning as you get to know many peoples working in this field for years. You get to compete with so many peoples around the world. There are so many Seminars that happen every year. Many researchers around the world come to these seminars to present their work so it is always recommended to attend these seminars.

I will end by this famous quote

“If you can’t win the game, change the rules”

Thank You for your time