Quantum computers take on health care: light-sensitive cancer drugs win US$2 million contest

"The winning group is working on improving a type of cancer drug that can be activated using light once it reaches a tumour, making it less toxic to the rest of the body than regular therapies are."

"The hardest parts of the simulation - replicating the way photons interact with electrons in a molecule - were performed on a nascent quantum computer at the Cleveland Clinic."

"The team won the US$2-million prize for demonstrating that the same algorithms, when run on more-capable quantum systems in the future, should be able to glean information about the molecules that would be impossible using classical simulations."

A team from Algorithmiq, IBM, and Cleveland Clinic won a $2-million prize for demonstrating quantum computing's potential in healthcare. They are developing light-sensitive cancer drugs that activate at tumors, reducing toxicity. The team simulated drug interactions with light, aiming to optimize drug properties for various cancer types. Complex simulations were performed using a hybrid approach, combining classical methods and nascent quantum computing. The algorithms could lead to breakthroughs in molecular design, including new antimicrobial drugs.

Read at Nature