Optimal stochastic modeling with unitary quantum dynamics

Abstract

Isolating past information relevant for future prediction is central to quantitative science. Quantum models offer a promising approach, enabling statistically faithful modeling while using less past information than any classical counterpart. Here we introduce a class of phase-enhanced quantum models, representing the most general means of simulating a stochastic process unitarily in causal order. The resulting constructions surpass previous state-of-art methods---both in reducing the information they need to store about the past and in the minimal memory dimension they require to store this information. Moreover, these two features are generally competing factors in optimization---leading to an ambiguity in optimal modeling that is unique to the quantum regime. Our results simultaneously offer quantum advantages for stochastic simulation and illustrate further qualitative differences between classical and quantum notions of complexity.