DENMARK – Denmark’s Novo Nordisk Foundation has pledged US$200 million (£176m) to develop what it says will be the first quantum computer dedicated to life sciences research and the green transition.

The practical quantum computer is envisioned to have applications ranging from creating new drugs to finding links between genes, environment, and disease.

The program has been launched by the nonprofit foundation – the majority owner of pharmaceutical group Novo Nordisk – in collaboration with the University of Copenhagen and includes world-leading researchers in quantum computing from Denmark, Canada, the Netherlands, and the USA.

By applying next-generation quantum computing to life sciences, the Novo Nordisk Foundation is expecting to speed up the development of new medicines and provide new insights into climate change and the green transition, which is not possible with standard computers today.

The ambition is that a quantum computer will also be a fundamental tool in designing new sustainable materials, delivering new energy-saving solutions, or assisting with new approaches to decarbonization.

While most computers process data in bits, with a binary value of either zero or one, quantum computers use a two-state unit for data processing called a qubit, which represents several digits simultaneously through a process known as superposition.

By being able to bridge binary digits, and cope with high levels of uncertainty, the devices can make highly complex calculations that cannot be done by regular computers.

This ability to perform large numbers of calculations simultaneously could be particularly useful for the modeling of chemical reactions, designing new materials, and searching huge databases.

“In the life sciences, for example, we can accelerate the development of personalized medicine by letting quantum computers process the enormous amount of data available on the human genome and diseases,” said Lene Oddershede, vice president head of the Novo Nordisk Foundation.

In a recent article, McKinsey Digital estimated the value of the opportunity to big pharma of applying quantum computing to protein structure and interactions at US$200 billion and highlighted that the opportunity across a range of technology-rich industries far exceeds that.

This potential is reflected in recent partnering announcements in the life sciences space, including IBM and the Cleveland Clinic entering into a 10-year partnership to accelerate discovery in healthcare and the life sciences.

Also, Boehringer Ingelheim and Google have collaborated to apply quantum computing to molecular dynamics simulations in a dedicated Quantum Lab.

Novo’s program open to collabo on specific projects

Although the foundation does not want to commit to any specific technology offered by large companies active in quantum computing such as IBM, Microsoft, and Alphabet, or the many start-ups in the field, the program is expected to be open to collaboration on specific projects.

The program will involve a large ecosystem of universities and industries including researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (United States), Delft University of Technology (the Netherlands), Technical University of Denmark, Aarhus University (Denmark), and the University of Toronto (Canada).

For the first seven years, the project is expected to focus on developing materials and hardware to build qubits.

In parallel, various quantum platforms are said to be explored and the most suitable quantum platform determined.

Eventually, the Foundation will look to scale up the technology to be used widely in life sciences research.

The UK has shown ambitions to be the world’s first quantum-ready economy. As part of this, in 2020, the UK pledged US$10.8 million (£10m) of funding to build the country’s first quantum computer.

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