  Numerical simulation of quantum systems is crucial to further our
understanding of natural phenomena. Many systems of key interest and
importance, in areas such as superconducting materials and quantum chemistry,
are thought to be described by models which we cannot solve with sufficient
accuracy, neither analytically nor numerically with classical computers. Using
a quantum computer to simulate such quantum systems has been viewed as a key
application of quantum computation from the very beginning of the field in the
1980s. Moreover, useful results beyond the reach of classical computation are
expected to be accessible with fewer than a hundred qubits, making quantum
simulation potentially one of the earliest practical applications of quantum
computers. In this paper we survey the theoretical and experimental development
of quantum simulation using quantum computers, from the first ideas to the
intense research efforts currently underway.
