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Completed TRL 9 (started at 4, targeting 9)
The origin of life is one of the most fundamental problems in science and a key research topic within the NASA Astrobiology Institute at Ames. Also, the problem of learning gene interaction networks from gene expression data is appealing to NASA's and the Nation's Synthetic Biology Initiative. In both of these vast emerging fields, several open questions remain unanswered. Many of these unknowns require computational power that significantly exceeds the capabilities of even the most powerful supercomputers available today or expected in the next decade. Quantum Computation is a promising approach to over-come these limitations, given its radically different way of processing information by using quantum mechanical effects to more efficiently explore the solution space of these intractable problems also known as NP-hard.
Synthetic biology and genetic engineering are disciplines at the core of solutions needed towards a sustainable bioeconomy. By providing a novel quantum technology capable of going beyond the reach of the available tools from computational biology and bioinformatics, our research will hopefully catalyze the needed breakthroughs in biological research to mitigate the Nation's needs. This proposal will also leverage NASA's in-vestment toward our leadership in quantum technologies and place our Center in an advantageous position as a pioneer in this new field of Quantum Computational Biology.
Listed on TechPort itself — the most direct way to ask about this specific project.
This is a mature technology (TRL 9) — the realistic path in is usually NASA's Technology Transfer Program: licensing an existing NASA patent, or a Space Act Agreement to use NASA facilities/expertise directly. NASA also runs a startup licensing program with no upfront fee for companies formed to commercialize a specific NASA technology.
None of these are guaranteed paths for this specific project — TechPort itself doesn't have an "apply" button. Reaching out to the contact(s) above with a specific question is usually the fastest way to find out what's actually open.