Photo: Jay Willett (WBZ)
CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (WBZ NewsRadio) — It's not rocket science; it's quantum mechanics.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology held its fifth iQuHACK this weekend. The quantum hackathon is run by the university's student-led Interdisciplinary Quantum Information Science and Engineering (iQuISE) program.
This year, the event gave student teams 24 hours to show how a quantum computer would solve day-to-day human dilemmas.
"iQu’s prompt asks to tell a story based on the principles of quantum mechanics that blend it with classical reality for people to better understand," Andrea Miramontes Serrano told WBZ NewsRadio Sunday.
Miramontes Serrano's Team Dragon came up with "Alice," a computer trying to climb the corporate ladder.
"She was trying to map things that have uncertainty in real life to the fact that there is noise in quantum circuits, and she used that in order to reassess and re-ask herself every time, is it worth to continue this relationship," Miramontes Serrano said.
"Trying to think critically about who to network with is normal," she continued. "It’s just X+Y+Z: X is your happiness at that point, your mood; Y, I think, was how influential is your role on a scale of 0-1; and then Z was the stock price of your company."
As part of iQuHACK, Team Dragon and more than 200 other participants presented their quantum hacks to industry professionals, adding another incentive to knock it out of the digital park.
"The fact that they’re there and expecting you to do this in 24 hours also gives you that extra push," Miramontes Serrano said.
WBZ's Jay Willett (@JayWillettWBZ) reports.
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