Q-AIM: A Unified Portable Workflow for Seamless Integration of Quantum Resources

Abstract: Quantum computing (QC) holds the potential to solve classically intractable problems. Although there has been significant progress towards the availability of quantum hardware, a software infrastructure to integrate them is still missing. We present Q-AIM (Quantum Access Infrastructure Management) to fill this gap. Q-AIM is a software framework unifying the access and management for quantum hardware in a vendor-independent and open-source fashion. Utilizing a dockerized micro-service architecture, we show Q-AIM's lightweight, portable, and customizable nature, capable of running on different hosting paradigms ranging from small personal computing devices to cloud servers and dedicated server infrastructure. Q-AIM exposes a single entry point into the host's infrastructure, providing secure and easy interaction with quantum computers on different levels of abstraction. With a minimal memory footprint, the container is optimized for deployment on even the smallest server instances, reducing costs and instantiation overhead while ensuring seamless scalability to accommodate increasing demands. Q-AIM intends to equip research groups and facilities purchasing and hosting their own quantum hardware with a tool simplifying the process from procurement to operation and removing non-research related technical redundancies.