The European Space Agency (ESA) is Europe’s gateway to space. Its mission is to shape the development of Europe’s space capability and ensure that investment in space continues to deliver benefits to the citizens of Europe and the world.
Find out more about space activities in our 23 Member States, and understand how ESA works together with their national agencies, institutions and organisations.
Exploring our Solar System and unlocking the secrets of the Universe
Go to topicProtecting life and infrastructure on Earth and in orbit
Go to topicUsing space to benefit citizens and meet future challenges on Earth
Go to topicMaking space accessible and developing the technologies for the future
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Quantum computers have the potential to process data in ways that classical computers cannot. However, their Achilles’ heel is 'decoherence', a sort of loss of information to the environment, which degrades the performance of quantum processes over time. Funded through ESA's Ariadna initiative, this project aims to speed up quantum computations to minimise the effect of decoherence. It will do so by applying novel artificial-intelligence based 'meta-heuristics' to the problem of compiling quantum circuits to emerging quantum hardware.
The project was implemented through ESA's Open Space Innovation Platform (OSIP), which seeks novel ideas for new space research activities. Campaigns and Channels invite solutions to specific problems or ideas on more general topics, with those run by Discovery & Preparation, including the Open Discovery Ideas Channel, specifically looking for ideas that could be implemented as system studies, early technology developments, or PhD or postdoc research co-funded by ESA and a university.