What's the appeal of this quantum drug discovery company in a partnership with IBM
On November 16, Algorithmiq, a quantum computing startup based in Helsinki, Finland, announced that it has entered into a collaboration with IBM to advance its exploration of quantum algorithms that attempt to solve complex problems in the life sciences [1].
01Working on Drug Development to Improve Quantum Hardware Performance in the NISQ Era
The collaboration brings together IBM's world-leading hardware, software and quantum application expertise with Algorithmiq's cutting-edge algorithm developers to explore ways to dramatically reduce the time and cost of drug discovery and development; this work will also contribute to the results generated by Qiskit, an open-source SDK for quantum computers, to promote and grow this nascent ecosystem. As part of the collaboration, Algorithmiq will become part of the IBM Quantum Network.
IBM researchers are working with Algorithmiq to address how to overcome major bottlenecks in today's NISQ quantum hardware, such as the limited speed, accuracy and scale of large quantum chemistry simulations.Algorithmiq's novel measurement techniques have been shown to significantly reduce the runtime of hybrid quantum classical algorithms; in addition, Algorithmiq's post-processing strategies for In addition, Algorithmiq's post-processing strategy for error reduction has been shown to significantly improve the accuracy of quantum chemistry simulations.
Thus, the collaboration between the two is expected to yield the expected results to improve the performance of quantum algorithms for near-term quantum technologies.
Founded by a team of world-leading academics in the field, Algorithmiq is focused on harnessing the power of quantum computing so that new drugs can be explored and eventually brought to market cost-effectively to enable precision medicine. On average, it currently takes about 10 years and $1 billion to bring a new drug to market. It is estimated that Algorithmiq's advances will shorten the time to market for new, more effective and less harmful drugs. algorithmiq hopes to harness the power of quantum computing combined with complex systems approaches to develop drugs to prevent and treat disease.
Sabrina Maniscalco
Professor of Quantum Information and Logic at the University of Helsinki, is also an adjunct professor at Aalto University, Finland, and deputy director of the Finnish Center of Excellence in Quantum Technologies.
Maniscalco represented Finland's quantum national strategy at the White House in May 2022 and is a national treasure in the Finnish quantum field.
We are excited to work with IBM as we look to combine our world-leading quantum algorithms with IBM's best-in-class hardware and quantum chemistry expertise to realize the full potential of IBM's quantum chemistry simulation technology," said Sabrina Maniscalco, CEO and co-founder of Algorithmiq. Quantum computing is the key to revolutionizing the drug discovery and development process. In pursuit of this mission, we are excited to partner with giants in the technology industry to put ourselves at the forefront of innovation and prove useful quantum advantages in the competition."
Ivano Tavernelli, global head of advanced algorithms for quantum simulation at IBM Research, said, "IBM believes that quantum advantages in areas such as quantum chemistry are provably possible within this decade. We are therefore pleased to be working with Algorithmiq to move the industry forward, and we are impressed with the promising results they have achieved to date in improving the performance of near-term quantum algorithms and believe the company's work is critical to blazing a trail to demonstrate quantum advantages through near-term quantum algorithms."
02In Conversation with Maniscalco: Founding the World's First Quantum Biotech Company
In a recent interview [2], Sabrina Maniscalco talks about how Algorithmiq will transform the life sciences and drug discovery fields through quantum software.
Q: What are Algorithmiq's goals as a company?
Maniscalco: As I mentioned, Algorithmiq is a quantum software company focused on the life sciences. What we're currently doing is creating a platform for quantum chemistry simulations, but also more broadly for simulating protein-ligand binding, which is one of the key processes in drug development and discovery.
Of course, there are other software companies doing similar things, but one of the main differences between us and the others is the way we develop the interface between quantum and classical post-processing. Because we are focused on near-term quantum computers, we are working to demonstrate quantum advantages in chemistry in the next year or two; in the next three years, we will demonstrate practical and industrially relevant quantum advantages in drug discovery and development.
Q: Quantum technology has not become commercially viable until recently. How do you think Algorithmiq will bring us closer to a commercial quantum future?
Maniscalco: For us, the main way to commercialize is through collaborations with pharmaceutical and biotech companies to identify use cases that can be addressed using these hybrid algorithms (Algorithmiq's proprietary technology).
Then there is the commercialization of our platform Aurora. We will open it up to other users who want to calculate molecular properties and binding affinities or binding energies, reactivity of properties useful in drug development and discovery frameworks, etc.
There will also be royalties from new drug patents later on, so this will eventually become a track. In the future, we plan to be a true full-stack quantum biotech company with everything we need in-house to solve unresolved problems in medicine.
We will be producing large datasets of new molecular compounds that exhibit low toxicity and high performance and are therefore successful in clinical trials.
Q: Why did you choose to focus on the life sciences?
Algorithmiq team.
Maniscalco: We believe that the first application of quantum computers in the near future will be quantum chemical simulation and materials simulation. In general, electronic structure problems. So this is one of the first applications where it makes sense for us to limit this. And then the second reason is we think it's a very influential area and there's a lot of funding. So it definitely makes sense because the pharmaceutical industry is in trouble right now.
It's well known that R&D spending on drug development and discovery has been steadily increasing over the years, but the number of new molecular entities and new drugs being discovered has remained the same. Often, pharmaceutical companies are failing. One statistic alone says it all: about 90% of the drugs available today do not cure 50% of the population. They are really failing for a number of reasons. One is the oversimplification of cell biology that we address with the network medicine approach, but another is that we need to be able to predict how small molecules bind to proteins, and it usually takes a full quantum mechanical approach to do that. Quantum computers are inherently designed to provide this capability.
Q: Will Algorithmiq be the first company to apply quantum algorithms to the life sciences?
Maniscalco: Yes, especially within the framework of a very comprehensive approach that we call quantum network medicine. We combine not only quantum chemistry simulations but also this multi-scale approach or data-driven approach as we call it, which starts with analyzing various data, such as histology, which allows us to identify the complex cell biology and determine in a more comprehensive way how molecules interact not only with one protein but also with multiple proteins.
Network medicine is an emerging field and we are collaborating with Professor Joseph Loscalzo and Harvard Medical School. We are providing the quantum aspects of network medicine so we can combine this data-driven approach and really launch the vision of quantum network medicine.
Q: How do you see Algorithmiq in five years?
Maniscalco: In five years, we will be the first quantum biotech company, and we will have demonstrated for the first time quantum advantages in chemistry and practical quantum advances in drug development and discovery.
In order to do that, we have to have the best team. So one of the things I'm most proud of is the team at Algorithmiq: the way it's formed, and the way it's united, and there's really no one competing for bragging rights. Everybody works well together, and most importantly, we're having fun.
I think we are making a profound contribution to a field that has real promise to change our lives in many ways.
Reference links：
[1]https://thequantuminsider.com/2022/11/16/ibm-and-algorithmiq-partner-on-useful-quantum-advantage-for-quantum-chemistry/
[2]https://www.azoquantum.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=376&PreviewCode=43b2de16-0033-4b26-84a0-0a3296dfada3
[3]https://qplaylearn.com/
