1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:05,000 We are coming to you live from the coldest place in the known universe! 2 00:00:05,000 --> 00:00:07,000 Well, near it anyway. 3 00:00:07,000 --> 00:00:11,000 What would you say if I told you that the headquarters for D-Wave, 4 00:00:11,000 --> 00:00:15,000 the world leader in commercial quantum computing systems, 5 00:00:15,000 --> 00:00:17,000 is a stone's throw from our warehouse? 6 00:00:17,000 --> 00:00:23,000 And what would you say if I told you that they invited us in for a behind-the-scenes tour? 7 00:00:23,000 --> 00:00:27,000 Well, Linus, I'd probably say that's exactly what I was expecting, 8 00:00:27,000 --> 00:00:29,000 given the title and thumbnail of this video. 9 00:00:29,000 --> 00:00:31,000 Stop wasting my time! 10 00:00:31,000 --> 00:00:41,800 Got it! Let's go! 11 00:00:41,800 --> 00:00:45,800 Cooler Master's 25th anniversary edition, Cosmos II, 12 00:00:45,800 --> 00:00:50,800 features a unique dual curved tempered glass side panel. 13 00:00:50,800 --> 00:00:53,800 Check it out now at the link below. 14 00:00:53,800 --> 00:00:59,150 So, in 2007, D-Wave introduced their first quantum processor. 15 00:00:59,150 --> 00:01:03,150 Now, with only 16 qubits, it wasn't especially powerful, 16 00:01:03,150 --> 00:01:07,150 but the point wasn't whether you could or couldn't solve the same problems 17 00:01:07,150 --> 00:01:08,150 with a 5-inch processor. 18 00:01:08,150 --> 00:01:10,150 You could use a pencil and a piece of paper. 19 00:01:10,150 --> 00:01:13,150 The point was that this scalable approach 20 00:01:13,150 --> 00:01:18,150 would allow them to ship the world's first commercial quantum computer, 21 00:01:18,150 --> 00:01:23,150 the D-Wave I, in 2011 with 128 qubits, 22 00:01:23,150 --> 00:01:29,150 followed by 512, 1000, and 2000 qubit designs 23 00:01:29,150 --> 00:01:34,150 in 2013, 2015, and 2017, respectively. 24 00:01:34,150 --> 00:01:37,150 And adding more qubits is the key to increasing performance, 25 00:01:37,150 --> 00:01:39,150 because the more qubits you add, 26 00:01:39,150 --> 00:01:43,150 the more complex the problems that you can tackle. 27 00:01:43,150 --> 00:01:47,150 You see, quantum computing doesn't work like classical computing 28 00:01:47,150 --> 00:01:51,150 with ones and zeros where you feed it a question 29 00:01:51,150 --> 00:01:53,150 and then it spits out an answer. 30 00:01:53,150 --> 00:01:59,150 Instead, a quantum processor takes all of the parameters you feed it 31 00:01:59,150 --> 00:02:01,150 and works on every solution, 32 00:02:01,150 --> 00:02:06,150 pointing you at one or two or maybe even more optimal solutions. 33 00:02:06,150 --> 00:02:09,150 So they're not perfect for everything. 34 00:02:09,150 --> 00:02:12,150 I don't think there's a single person in this building 35 00:02:12,150 --> 00:02:15,150 who expects Call of Duty Black Ops 10 36 00:02:15,150 --> 00:02:20,150 to run on a D-Wave Mach 5 quantum gaming rig or anything like that. 37 00:02:20,150 --> 00:02:25,150 But for scheduling out a sports team's games over the course of a season, 38 00:02:25,150 --> 00:02:30,150 for tackling problems like logistics, climate change, and energy distribution, 39 00:02:30,150 --> 00:02:33,150 or for conducting AI research, 40 00:02:33,150 --> 00:02:35,150 these puppies right here 41 00:02:35,150 --> 00:02:41,150 have the potential to completely disrupt the existing players. 42 00:02:41,150 --> 00:02:43,150 So then let's go have a look at one, shall we? 43 00:02:43,150 --> 00:02:47,150 Now, there are only a handful of customers in the world 44 00:02:47,150 --> 00:02:52,150 who have actually ponied up the price of a D-Wave system, 45 00:02:52,150 --> 00:02:55,150 including high rollers like Lockheed Martin, 46 00:02:55,150 --> 00:02:59,150 Los Alamos National Lab, Google, and NASA. 47 00:02:59,150 --> 00:03:02,150 But D-Wave themselves have a handful 48 00:03:02,150 --> 00:03:05,150 of their latest generation 2000 Q7 49 00:03:05,150 --> 00:03:08,150 systems running here at their headquarters 50 00:03:08,150 --> 00:03:11,150 that are available through the cloud. 51 00:03:11,150 --> 00:03:13,150 Just make sure that you don't turn off any of the ones 52 00:03:13,150 --> 00:03:18,150 with a delightfully low-tech online sign zip-tied to it. 53 00:03:18,150 --> 00:03:21,150 It might be doing very, very important research. 54 00:03:21,150 --> 00:03:24,150 So from the outside, a 2000 Q doesn't look that different 55 00:03:24,150 --> 00:03:28,150 from any other compute cluster with a few black racks. 56 00:03:28,150 --> 00:03:31,150 And when you open up door number one, 57 00:03:31,150 --> 00:03:33,150 there's not much at first glance 58 00:03:33,150 --> 00:03:35,150 to indicate that there's anything special 59 00:03:35,150 --> 00:03:36,150 about it. 60 00:03:36,150 --> 00:03:42,150 You'll find a network switch, a UPS for battery backup, 61 00:03:42,150 --> 00:03:45,150 a normal server responsible for monitoring, 62 00:03:45,150 --> 00:03:48,150 some monitoring devices that... 63 00:03:48,150 --> 00:03:50,150 Wait a minute. 64 00:03:50,150 --> 00:03:55,150 Seven, eight degrees milli-Kelvin? 65 00:03:55,150 --> 00:03:57,150 We're gonna have to get back to that later. 66 00:03:57,150 --> 00:04:01,150 There's also a second server that takes a problem 67 00:04:01,150 --> 00:04:03,150 and translates it into machine code 68 00:04:03,150 --> 00:04:05,150 using custom room-temperature electricity 69 00:04:05,150 --> 00:04:08,150 electronics to generate high-precision analog signals 70 00:04:08,150 --> 00:04:11,150 that it then sends to, as we promised, 71 00:04:11,150 --> 00:04:15,150 just about the coldest place in the known universe, 72 00:04:15,150 --> 00:04:18,150 the single, yes, just one chip, 73 00:04:18,150 --> 00:04:22,150 single codename Washington quantum processor 74 00:04:22,150 --> 00:04:25,150 at the heart of this machine. 75 00:04:25,150 --> 00:04:27,150 But where exactly is it? 76 00:04:27,150 --> 00:04:32,980 It's not behind door two or door number three. 77 00:04:32,980 --> 00:04:34,980 Back there, you'll find the first 78 00:04:34,980 --> 00:04:36,980 and second stage pumps that are used 79 00:04:36,980 --> 00:04:39,980 to create a vacuum around the processor 80 00:04:39,980 --> 00:04:41,980 to thermally insulate it 81 00:04:41,980 --> 00:04:44,980 and its cooling system from the outside world, 82 00:04:44,980 --> 00:04:46,980 as well as a compressor 83 00:04:46,980 --> 00:04:48,980 for the aforementioned cooling system. 84 00:04:48,980 --> 00:04:53,980 And you also won't find it in this barrel-shaped doodad. 85 00:04:53,980 --> 00:04:56,980 That is actually a liquid nitrogen filter 86 00:04:56,980 --> 00:04:59,980 that removes impurities from the coolant mixture 87 00:04:59,980 --> 00:05:02,980 of helium-3 and helium-4 isotopes 88 00:05:02,980 --> 00:05:03,980 and is one of the things 89 00:05:03,980 --> 00:05:06,980 that allows D-Wave systems to run 90 00:05:06,980 --> 00:05:08,980 for years at a time, 91 00:05:08,980 --> 00:05:11,980 a critical feature given that the chip 92 00:05:11,980 --> 00:05:14,980 kind of locks into a certain configuration 93 00:05:14,980 --> 00:05:16,980 once it's super cooled. 94 00:05:16,980 --> 00:05:18,980 And if you heat one of these puppies up 95 00:05:18,980 --> 00:05:19,980 back to room temperature, 96 00:05:19,980 --> 00:05:21,980 it can take up to two days 97 00:05:21,980 --> 00:05:22,980 to cool it back down 98 00:05:22,980 --> 00:05:24,980 and up to four weeks 99 00:05:24,980 --> 00:05:26,980 to finish the rebalancing 100 00:05:26,980 --> 00:05:29,980 or recalibration process. 101 00:05:29,980 --> 00:05:31,980 No, no, to find the actual processor, 102 00:05:31,980 --> 00:05:33,980 we have to go past 103 00:05:33,980 --> 00:05:35,980 this first door on the left here 104 00:05:35,980 --> 00:05:37,980 that handles connecting the 105 00:05:37,980 --> 00:05:40,980 all-business racks at the front 106 00:05:40,980 --> 00:05:44,270 to the giant box here 107 00:05:44,270 --> 00:05:46,270 that was hiding in plain sight 108 00:05:46,270 --> 00:05:48,270 that I'll be referring to as the 109 00:05:48,270 --> 00:05:50,270 party in the back 110 00:05:50,270 --> 00:05:54,590 or, per D-Wave's gentle suggestion, 111 00:05:54,590 --> 00:05:57,590 the shielded enclosure. 112 00:05:57,590 --> 00:05:59,590 This right here is effectively 113 00:05:59,590 --> 00:06:01,590 a big Faraday cage 114 00:06:01,590 --> 00:06:04,590 and the first of 16 layers 115 00:06:04,590 --> 00:06:06,590 of shielding that are designed 116 00:06:06,590 --> 00:06:08,590 to shield the power lines 117 00:06:08,590 --> 00:06:10,590 and preserve the integrity 118 00:06:10,590 --> 00:06:13,590 of the signals to and from 119 00:06:13,590 --> 00:06:15,590 the quantum processor 120 00:06:15,590 --> 00:06:18,590 to the greatest degree possible. 121 00:06:18,590 --> 00:06:20,620 And that was a very intentional pun, 122 00:06:20,620 --> 00:06:21,620 by the way. 123 00:06:21,620 --> 00:06:24,620 Now, normally, these rooms are closed 124 00:06:24,620 --> 00:06:27,620 and there is a series of casings 125 00:06:27,620 --> 00:06:30,620 on top of this apparatus here 126 00:06:30,620 --> 00:06:32,620 to maintain the vacuum around 127 00:06:32,620 --> 00:06:33,620 what is effectively 128 00:06:33,620 --> 00:06:36,620 the motherboard of our quantum computer. 129 00:06:36,620 --> 00:06:39,620 But they had one open for maintenance today, 130 00:06:39,620 --> 00:06:42,620 so we got to get up close and personal. 131 00:06:42,620 --> 00:06:44,620 The thing is peppered 132 00:06:44,620 --> 00:06:46,620 with probes and sensors, 133 00:06:46,620 --> 00:06:49,620 heat exchangers, data wires, 134 00:06:49,620 --> 00:06:52,620 but the five big plates 135 00:06:52,620 --> 00:06:55,620 are really the main attraction here. 136 00:06:55,620 --> 00:06:57,620 Each of them represents a different stage 137 00:06:57,620 --> 00:06:59,620 of the cooling system. 138 00:06:59,620 --> 00:07:01,620 The top one gets signals 139 00:07:01,620 --> 00:07:02,620 from the outside world 140 00:07:02,620 --> 00:07:04,620 on copper wires 141 00:07:04,620 --> 00:07:07,620 and runs at a frosty 70 degrees Kelvin. 142 00:07:07,620 --> 00:07:10,620 The next one down uses the same fridge 143 00:07:10,620 --> 00:07:12,620 and these braided copper conductors 144 00:07:12,620 --> 00:07:15,620 to get down to four degrees Kelvin, 145 00:07:15,620 --> 00:07:17,620 which is both low enough 146 00:07:17,620 --> 00:07:19,620 to condense helium to a liquid 147 00:07:19,620 --> 00:07:23,620 and to switch over from copper wires 148 00:07:23,620 --> 00:07:26,620 to the superconductor niobium. 149 00:07:26,620 --> 00:07:29,620 The middle plate here uses vacuumed helium-4 150 00:07:29,620 --> 00:07:31,620 to drop our signal wires 151 00:07:31,620 --> 00:07:33,620 to one degree Kelvin. 152 00:07:33,620 --> 00:07:35,620 The fourth uses helium-3 153 00:07:35,620 --> 00:07:38,620 to get us to about a tenth of that. 154 00:07:38,620 --> 00:07:41,620 And the final stage uses a sophisticated mixture 155 00:07:41,620 --> 00:07:43,620 of those two isotopes 156 00:07:43,620 --> 00:07:46,620 to drive this entire filtering 157 00:07:46,620 --> 00:07:48,620 and shielding apparatus 158 00:07:48,620 --> 00:07:51,620 as well as the processor inside 159 00:07:51,620 --> 00:07:53,620 down to its typical operating temperature 160 00:07:53,620 --> 00:07:57,620 of about 0.015 degrees Kelvin, 161 00:07:57,620 --> 00:08:00,620 damn near absolute zero. 162 00:08:00,620 --> 00:08:03,620 But why does it need to be so cold? 163 00:08:03,620 --> 00:08:06,620 Niobium already superconducts at nine degrees Kelvin. 164 00:08:06,620 --> 00:08:10,620 Interstellar space is 3.1 degrees Kelvin. 165 00:08:10,620 --> 00:08:12,620 Our solar system is even warmer. 166 00:08:12,620 --> 00:08:16,620 We're talking 0.015 degrees Kelvin. 167 00:08:16,620 --> 00:08:21,820 Well, this superconducting chip here 168 00:08:21,820 --> 00:08:23,820 is what's inside there, 169 00:08:23,820 --> 00:08:27,820 and it's connected via 400 superconducting wires. 170 00:08:27,820 --> 00:08:29,820 And this is kind of like the pins 171 00:08:29,820 --> 00:08:31,820 on a CPU socket. 172 00:08:31,820 --> 00:08:32,820 And what it's doing 173 00:08:32,820 --> 00:08:35,820 is it's using quantum mechanical effects 174 00:08:35,820 --> 00:08:38,820 to process information. 175 00:08:38,820 --> 00:08:41,820 So for that to work, 176 00:08:41,820 --> 00:08:45,820 these effects need to be significant enough 177 00:08:45,820 --> 00:08:47,820 to use them for computation, 178 00:08:47,820 --> 00:08:49,820 which means that the temperature 179 00:08:49,820 --> 00:08:52,820 needs to be well below 180 00:08:52,820 --> 00:08:55,820 the energy scale of those quantum effects. 181 00:08:55,820 --> 00:08:56,820 If it wasn't, 182 00:08:56,820 --> 00:08:58,820 then the data you'd get 183 00:08:58,820 --> 00:09:00,820 would be very, very noisy, 184 00:09:00,820 --> 00:09:04,820 corrupted by heat-related quantum effects. 185 00:09:04,820 --> 00:09:07,820 That's why the colder they can get, 186 00:09:07,820 --> 00:09:09,820 pretty much the better. 187 00:09:09,820 --> 00:09:11,820 And getting even colder in the future 188 00:09:11,820 --> 00:09:14,820 may actually be practical. 189 00:09:14,820 --> 00:09:18,820 So this generation of D-Waves processors 190 00:09:18,820 --> 00:09:20,820 consumes no power 191 00:09:20,820 --> 00:09:23,820 and outputs no heat, 192 00:09:23,820 --> 00:09:27,820 meaning that the 20 kilowatts of power 193 00:09:27,820 --> 00:09:29,820 that are required to run the system 194 00:09:29,820 --> 00:09:33,820 is just dedicated to the cooling system. 195 00:09:33,820 --> 00:09:36,820 So unless they wanted to go colder, 196 00:09:36,820 --> 00:09:39,820 this energy cost doesn't change 197 00:09:39,820 --> 00:09:41,820 whether you're running 100 qubits 198 00:09:41,820 --> 00:09:43,820 or 2,000 qubits. 199 00:09:43,820 --> 00:09:45,820 That's just the sweet spot 200 00:09:45,820 --> 00:09:49,820 of practicality and functionality today. 201 00:09:49,820 --> 00:09:51,820 And more cooling is far from the only thing 202 00:09:51,820 --> 00:09:52,820 on the horizon. 203 00:09:52,820 --> 00:09:54,820 The future's looking bright 204 00:09:54,820 --> 00:09:56,820 for our neighbors here at D-Wave. 205 00:09:56,820 --> 00:09:59,820 They don't have a 50-year vision yet necessarily, 206 00:09:59,820 --> 00:10:01,820 but in the nearer term, 207 00:10:01,820 --> 00:10:04,820 they don't really perceive anyone else in the space 208 00:10:04,820 --> 00:10:06,820 as a real competitor 209 00:10:06,820 --> 00:10:08,820 with a commercializable technology. 210 00:10:08,820 --> 00:10:10,820 And with more R&D focus, 211 00:10:10,820 --> 00:10:13,820 they think their system could be as compact 212 00:10:13,820 --> 00:10:15,820 as three or four racks 213 00:10:15,820 --> 00:10:17,820 and capable of taking on 214 00:10:17,820 --> 00:10:20,820 some of the hardest neural network problems 215 00:10:20,820 --> 00:10:23,820 that we face in the years to come. 216 00:10:23,820 --> 00:10:24,820 And you know what? 217 00:10:24,820 --> 00:10:26,820 Sounds pretty good to me. 218 00:10:26,820 --> 00:10:29,300 Dollar Shave Club is kind of amazing. 219 00:10:29,300 --> 00:10:31,300 You can get their high-quality blades 220 00:10:31,300 --> 00:10:33,300 and their amazing shave butter, 221 00:10:33,300 --> 00:10:34,300 which goes on clear, 222 00:10:34,300 --> 00:10:36,300 delivered to your door 223 00:10:36,300 --> 00:10:38,300 for less than what you'd pay 224 00:10:38,300 --> 00:10:41,300 to have to actually get off your own butt, 225 00:10:41,300 --> 00:10:42,300 drive to 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259 00:11:38,550 --> 00:11:39,550 But if you liked it, 260 00:11:39,550 --> 00:11:40,550 hit the like button, 261 00:11:40,550 --> 00:11:41,550 get subscribed, 262 00:11:41,550 --> 00:11:42,550 and maybe check out 263 00:11:42,550 --> 00:11:44,550 where to buy the stuff we featured 264 00:11:44,550 --> 00:11:45,550 at the link in the video description. 265 00:11:45,550 --> 00:11:48,550 Okay, less applicable for this video than usual, 266 00:11:48,550 --> 00:11:50,550 but we also have links down there 267 00:11:50,550 --> 00:11:51,550 to our merch store, 268 00:11:51,550 --> 00:11:52,550 which has cool shirts like this one, 269 00:11:52,550 --> 00:11:53,550 and our community forum, 270 00:11:53,550 --> 00:11:56,550 which you should totally join.