QuSecure announced that the public-private initiative it sponsored, QuForce, is emerging as the world's leading community for quantum computing experts, academics and enthusiasts. QuForce held its first-ever QuForce Demo Day last week to showcase the research of the first class of QuForce Fellows, which included six demos and nine participating Fellows that competed over a six-month period.

"Congratulations to the inaugural winners of the QuForce Demo Day!" said QuForce Co-Director Jim Schwoebel, former CEO of NeuroLex Laboratories (acquired by Sonde Health, Inc.). "The creativity and quantum ingenuity of these QuForce Fellows was outstanding. QuForce is a growing community of quantum enthusiasts from all walks of life, which was put on display during our first Demo Day. We are excited about our continued growth in membership and are already planning our next Demo Day."

Founded in 2021, QuForce is the world's leading community in post-quantum cryptography and white hat hacking, established with the goal of connecting experts, academics and enthusiasts in the world's leading post-quantum cryptography network. The forum enables individuals to help contribute to the betterment of a quantum era world, supporting their passion and interest in quantum computing and everything around the quantum era. The group is working on the cutting edge of all things quantum within academia, business and philanthropy, to support the growing interest and need to build a quantum-aware and continually educated group of people to address the impacts of quantum computing on our society. To view the archived recording of the QuForce Demo Day, see https://demoday.quforce.org.

"QuSecure has a mission as the leader in post-quantum cryptography to continually advance the importance and urgency of what quantum computing will bring to the world," said QuForce Co-Director and QuSecure Chief Product Officer Rebecca Krauthamer. "QuSecure is proud to be the co-founder and sponsor of QuForce, an organization dedicated to empowering professionals from non-traditional backgrounds to enter the quantum ecosystem and explore all their interests in this rapidly emerging space. A huge thank you goes out to the Mentors who helped guide and support skill development for our Fellows. Thank you to Alex Khan, Laura Thomas, Jim, and several others for your mentorship."

QuForce defines "non-traditional" as members who do not have degrees in quantum computing or physics who are from any background, including government, academia, public service, or private business. Anyone with a passion for learning the relevance of quantum computing and the impacts it will have on society is welcome. QuForce collaborates with individuals from companies such as Amazon, Cisco, Google, the FDA, D-Wave Quantum, Georgia Tech, and Stanford University. The QuForce Demo Day was the culmination event of a six-month competition for four prizes - First Place, Second Place, Third Place, and the Most Novel Award. Demos were judged according to three criteria: 1) the impact of the demo on QuForce; 2) the impact the demo project had on the individuals completing the project (e.g. in the field of quantum computing); and 3) the overall quality of the demo.

Winners were awarded cash prizes as well as continued project funding. First Place was awarded a tie between The Preliminary Unitary API project, run by Jonathan Johnson; and the Asymmetric Cloning to Eavesdrop on BB84 Protocol project, run by Elizabeth Campolongo, Brian Pigott, and Hardik Routray. The first project showcased impactful approaches to teaching quantum physics and quantum computing software engineering by embedding core concepts into computer games to build intuition for the concepts and gamify the learning process. The second project demonstrated critical vulnerabilities in quantum key distribution (QKD) protocols. Third place went to Alaap Murali for his Quantum Computing as a Product project. The Most Novel Award went to Siddharth Rangnekar and Nizar Lethif for their Asymmetric Bases Cloning: A Novel Approach to Cloning-based Attacks on BB84 project.

For more information on QuForce, including how to become a General Member, Mentor, Fellow, or Director, see https://quforce.org/.