The PhD position is supported by a fellowship from the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Innovative Training Network MOQS (MOlecular Quantum Simulations). (moqs.eu)

Main host Institution: University of L’Aquila (Italy) 
Secondment Institutions: IBM-Reseach, Zurich (Switzerland) and CINECA, Bologna (Italy)

The project deals with the development of new strategies to tackle the electronic structure of molecular systems using quantum computers. Currently available quantum devices in combination with algorithms such as the Variational Quantum Eigensolver are a valuable route to reach the chemical accuracy of the evaluation of ground state molecular energies. A crucial role in this process is to design wavefunctions that are at the same time accurate and compact, in order to have low-depth circuits using a small number of gate operations. The PhD student will develop hardware efficient wavefunctions and algorithms inspired by many-body and quantum chemistry techniques. Error mitigation schemes will be also developed to further increase the accuracy of the obtained results. The developed methodology will be applied to several chemical systems, including well-known correlated and “difficult” cases in quantum chemistry.