Quantum systems have started to emerge as a disruptive technology and enabling platforms - exploiting the principles of quantum mechanics - to achieve quantum supremacy in computing. Academic research, industrial projects (e.g., Amazon Braket), and consortiums like 'Quantum Flagship' are striving to develop practically capable and commercially viable quantum computing (QC) systems and technologies. Quantum Computing as a Service (QCaaS) is viewed as a solution attuned to the philosophy of service-orientation that can offer QC resources and platforms, as utility computing, to individuals and organisations who do not own quantum computers. To understand the quantum service development life cycle and pinpoint emerging trends, we used evidence-based software engineering approach to conduct a systematic mapping study (SMS) of research that enables or enhances QCaaS. The SMS process retrieved a total of 55 studies, and based on their qualitative assessment we selected 9 of them to investigate (i) the functional aspects, design models, patterns, programming languages, deployment platforms, and (ii) trends of emerging research on QCaaS. The results indicate three modelling notations and a catalogue of five design patterns to architect QCaaS, whereas Python (native code or frameworks) and Amazon Braket are the predominant solutions to implement and deploy QCaaS solutions. From the quantum software engineering (QSE) perspective, this SMS provides empirically grounded findings that could help derive processes, patterns, and reference architectures to engineer software services for QC.

翻译：量子系统已开始作为颠覆性技术及赋能平台崭露头角——利用量子力学原理——在计算领域实现量子霸权。学术研究、工业项目（如Amazon Braket）以及"量子旗舰"等联盟正致力于开发具有实际能力且具备商业可行性的量子计算系统与相关技术。量子计算即服务被视为与面向服务理念相契合的解决方案，能够以效用计算模式向未拥有量子计算机的个人和组织提供量子计算资源与平台。为理解量子服务开发生命周期并识别新兴趋势，我们采用基于证据的软件工程方法，对支持或增强量子计算即服务的研究进行了系统映射研究。通过该流程共检索到55项研究，经定性评估后筛选出9篇，用以探究：(i)功能特性、设计模型、模式、编程语言、部署平台，以及(ii)量子计算即服务新兴研究趋势。结果表明，存在三种建模符号体系和五种设计模式目录用于架构量子计算即服务，而Python（原生代码或框架）与Amazon Braket是实现及部署量子计算即服务解决方案的主流选择。从量子软件工程视角而言，本系统映射研究提供了基于实证的发现，有助于推导量子计算服务工程化过程中所需的过程、模式及参考架构。