Speaker's Brief Introduction： Hiroki TAKESUE received his B.E., M.E., and Ph.D. degrees in engineering science from Osaka University, Japan, in 1994, 1996, and 2002, respectively. After joining NTT Laboratories in 1996, he has been engaged in research on optical and quantum communications and optical computing. He is currently a Senior Distinguished Researcher and the Director of Quantum Science and Technology Laboratory in NTT Basic Research Laboratories. He was a Visiting Scholar at Stanford University, Stanford, CA from 2004 to 2005, and a guest researcher at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), Boulder, CO in 2014.
Abstract: As the development of digital computers nears saturation, there is increasing research and development focused on creating computers that efficiently solve problems that traditional digital computers find challenging, using the dynamics of physical systems. One notable approach is the "Ising machine," which converts combinatorial optimization problems into the task of finding the ground state of the Ising model, solving these problems through experiments with artificial spin systems. NTT is working on a coherent Ising machine (CIM) that simulates the Ising model using coupled degenerate optical parametric oscillators (DOPO) as an artificial spin system. In this presentation, I will discuss the principles of CIM, the current status of the large-scale CIM developed at NTT, and its applications to combinatorial optimization problems, as well as future developments.