The United States is the undisputed world leader in quantum computing despite China spending eight times as much on the technology, but an own goal could soon erode American dominance.

Processors that perform supercomputing tasks in the blink of an eye. Batteries that recharge in an instant. Accelerated drug discovery, encryption and decryption, and machine learning. These are just some of the possibilities that quantum computing can offer, which takes advantage of the laws of physics to perform calculations much faster than even the most powerful traditional computers. They all depend on research here in the United States, the world’s undisputed leader in quantum computing.

How did the United States become the epicenter of this technological revolution? It didn’t happen by accident. Quantum computing and world-class American research universities have grown hand in hand, driven by a policy environment that encourages scientists and entrepreneurs to commercialize academic research.

The secret of American ingenuity

Consider our quantum computing company, IonQ. As professors of engineering and physics at Duke and the University of Maryland (UMD), we founded the company in 2015 using our research, which was largely funded by the Department of Defense and the Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity (IARPA). , a government organization that invests in cutting-edge technology for the intelligence community. We have also received significant funding from the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the Department of Energy.

In 2020, we opened a $5.5 million, 23,000-square-foot facility in College Park to house our state-of-the-art quantum machinery. The following year, IonQ was valued at $2 billion at the time of our initial public offering and became the first publicly traded quantum hardware and software company.

In addition to government funding, we owe much of our success to UMD and Duke’s investment in our quantum research. UMD has more than 200 quantum researchers, including a Nobel laureate in a joint institute shared between the university and NIST, and has awarded more than 100 PhDs in physics with a quantum focus. Duke recently established the world’s only “vertical” quantum computing center, which conducts research and development combining every stage of the quantum computing process, from the assembly of individual atoms and the engineering of their electronic drivers to the design of algorithms and quantum applications.

But we also owe it to a little-known law, without which none of this would have been possible: the Bayh-Dole Act of 1980. Before its passage, the federal government owned the patents for inventions resulting from academic research that had been received some recognition. amount of federal funds. However, the government lacked the capacity to further develop university advancements, so the vast majority simply sat collecting dust on shelves.

Bayh-Dole allowed universities to own the patents on their scientists’ inventions, which has had a galvanizing impact. Suddenly, academic institutions were incentivized to license those patents to the private sector, where they could be transformed into valuable goods and services, while spurring entrepreneurship among the researchers who came up with those inventions in the first place.

Bayh-Dole’s legacy at stake

Unfortunately, the federal government could soon undermine the Bayh-Dole system, which could greatly stifle new advances in quantum computing. The Biden administration just announced that it is seeking to use the law’s “march in” provision to impose price controls on inventions that were originally developed with federal funds if “the price… at which the product is currently offered to the public [is] is unreasonable.” This notion arises from ignorance of the core value of entrepreneurship and commercialization: while ideas are conceived and tested in universities using federal funds, it is the enormous amount of effort invested by the licensee that turns those ideas and patents on useful products and services.

Abusing entry would not make new technologies more accessible to consumers or anyone else, but would do just the opposite. Devaluing the investment needed to turn these ideas into successful, practical products could discourage private sector companies from taking risks by licensing university research in the first place.

When it comes to quantum computing, that chilling effect on research and development would greatly jeopardize US national security. Our projects received extensive funding from defense and intelligence agencies for good reason. Quantum computing could soon become the standard technology for breaking codes and defending large computer networks against cyber attacks.

Adoption of the proposed entry framework would also have important implications for our future economic stability. While it remains a nascent technology today, quantum computing’s ability to rapidly process huge volumes of data will revolutionize business for decades to come. It may be the only way to capture the complexity needed for future AI and machine learning in, for example, autonomous vehicles. It can enable companies to refine their supply chains and other logistics operations, such as manufacturing, with unprecedented precision. It can also transform finance by allowing portfolio managers to create new and superior investment strategies and algorithms.

Given the technology’s immense potential, it’s no mystery why China committed what is believed to be more than $15 billion in 2022 to develop its quantum computing capacity—more than double the countries’ quantum computing budget. of the EU and eight times what the United States government plans to allocate. spend.

Fortunately, the United States still has a clear advantage in quantum computing… for now. Our universities attract many more leading experts and leaders in the field than those of any other nation, including China, by a wide margin. Our entrepreneurial culture, often generated from the innovation of our universities, is the envy of the world. And unlike Europe, our government incentivizes risk-taking and entrepreneurship through public-private partnerships.

However, if the Biden administration dismantles the law that makes this collaboration possible, there is no guarantee that our global dominance in quantum computing will persist in the long term. That would have devastating second-order effects on our national security and our economic future. Computer scientists, ordinary Americans, and the intelligence and defense communities can only hope that our officials reconsider their proposal.

Jungsang Kim is a professor of ECE and physics at Duke University. Christopher Monroe is a professor of ECE and physics at Duke University and the University of Maryland, College Park. In 2015, they co-founded IonQ, Inc., the first publicly traded quantum hardware and software company.

The secret of American ingenuity

Bayh-Dole’s legacy at stake

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