Discrete Quantum Walk Research Articles

Quantum walks over a square lattice

Quantum random walk finds application in efficient quantum algorithms as well as in quantum network theory. Here we study the mixing time of a discrete quantum walk over a square lattice in the presence of dynamic percolation and decoherence. We consider bit-flip and phase damping noise, and evaluate the instantaneous mixing time for both the cases. Using numerical analysis we show that, in the case of phase damping noise, the probability distribution of walker's position is sufficiently close to the uniform distribution after infinite time. However, during the action of bit-flip noise, even after infinite time the total variational distance between the two probability distributions is large enough.

Discrete spacetime, quantum walks, and relativistic wave equations

It has been observed that quantum walks on regular lattices can give rise to wave equations for relativistic particles in the continuum limit. In this paper we define the 3D walk as a product of three coined one-dimensional walks. The factor corresponding to each one-dimensional walk involves two projection operators that act on an internal coin space, each projector is associated with either the "forward" or "backward" direction in that physical dimension. We show that the simple requirement that there is no preferred axis or direction along an axis---that is, that the walk be symmetric under parity transformations and rotations that swap the axes of the cubic lattice---leads to the requirement that the continuum limit of the walk is fully Lorentz invariant. We show further that, in the case of a massive particle, this simple symmetry requirement necessitates that inclusion of antimatter---the use of a four-dimensional internal space---and that the "coin flip" operation is generated by the parity transformation on the internal coin space, while the differences of the projection operators associated to each dimension must all anticommute. Finally, we discuss the leading correction to the continuum limit, and the possibility of distinguishing through experiment between the discrete random walk and the continuum-based Dirac equation as a description of fermion dynamics.

MATLAB Programming to Implement Quantum Walk Algorithm for Presenting Probability Distributions of Quantum Walks

There are numerous ideas that have been provided by quantum walks for new quantum algorithms. In this article, we surveyed the discrete quantum walk algorithm to present probability distributions. Moreover, we transformed the algorithm into MATLAB programming. Finally, the programming can be utilised to compare coin flip transformations that generate probability distributions as proposed in several previous articles and also to identify a unitarity of a coin flip transformation.

Eliminating the texture features in visually meaningful cipher images

Generally, most image encryption algorithms transform original images into texture-like or noise-like ones. Unfortunately the feature like texture or noise is just a hint of the existence of encryption for attackers. To solve this problem, Bao and Zhou [2] proposed a new image encryption algorithm which can transform original images into visually meaningful ones. However, the resulting cipher images have some texture features which may be a hint of the existence of encryption to some extent. To overcome this flaw, we present a new visually meaningful image encryption algorithm based on discrete wavelet transform and discrete quantum walks. Numerical simulation, security analysis and performance comparison demonstrate that our proposal is superior to Bao et al.’s scheme. It promotes the combination of image encryption and quantum computation.

Quantum Ratchet in Disordered Quantum Walk

Symmetrically evolving discrete quantum walk results in dynamic localization with zero mean displacement when the standard evolution operations are replaced by a temporal disorder evolution operation. In this work we show that the quantum ratchet action, that is, a directed transport in standard or disordered discrete‐time quantum walk can be realized by introducing a pawl like effect realized by using a fixed coin operation at marked positions that is, different from the ones used for evolution at other positions. We also show that the combination of standard and disordered evolution operations can be optimized to get the mean displacement of order ∝ t (number of walk steps). This model of quantum ratchet in quantum walk is defined using only a set of entangling unitary operators resulting in the coherent quantum transport.

A simulator for discrete quantum walks on lattices

In this paper, we present a simulator for two-particle quantum walks on the line and one-particle on a two-dimensional squared lattice. It can be used to investigate the equivalence between the two cases (one- and two-particle walks) for various boundary conditions (open, circular, reflecting, absorbing and their combinations). For the case of a single walker on a two-dimensional lattice, the simulator can also implement the Möbius strip. Furthermore, other topologies for the walker are also simulated by the proposed tool, like certain types of planar graphs with degree up to 4, by considering missing links over the lattice. The main purpose of the simulator is to study the genuinely quantum effects on the global properties of the two-particle joint probability distribution on the entanglement between the walkers/axis. For that purpose, the simulator is designed to compute various quantities such as: the entanglement and classical correlations, (classical and quantum) mutual information, the average distance between the two walkers, different hitting times and quantum discord. These quantities are of vital importance in designing possible algorithmic applications of quantum walks, namely in search, 3-SAT problems, etc. The simulator can also implement the static partial measurements of particle(s) positions and dynamic breaking of the links between certain nodes, both of which can be used to investigate the effects of decoherence on the walker(s). Finally, the simulator can be used to investigate the dynamic Anderson-like particle localization by varying the coin operators of certain nodes on the line/lattice. We also present some illustrative and relevant examples of one- and two-particle quantum walks in various scenarios. The tool was implemented in C and is available on-line at http://qwsim.weebly.com/ .

Quantum walks on embedded hypercubes: Nonsymmetric and nonlocal cases

The expected hitting time of discrete quantum walks on a hypercube (HC) is numerically known to be exponentially shorter than that of their classical analogs in terms of the scaling with the HC dimension. Recent numerical analyses illustrated that this scaling exists not only on the bare HC, but also when the HC graph is symmetrically and locally embedded into larger graphs. The present work investigates the necessity of symmetry and locality for the speed-up by considering embeddings that are nonsymmetric or nonlocal. We provide numerical evidence that the exponential speed-up survives also in these cases. Furthermore, our numerical simulations demonstrate that removing a single edge from the HC also does not destroy the exponential speed-up. In the nonlocal embedding of the HC we encounter dark states, which we analyze. We provide a general and detailed presentation of the mapping that reduces the exponentially large Hilbert space of the quantum walk to an effective subspace of polynomial scaling. This mapping is our essential tool to numerically study quantum walks in such high-dimensional structures.

Dynamic behaviors of spreading in generalized Fibonacci time quasiperiodic quantum walks

Quantum walk (QW), the quantum mechanical counterpart of classical random walk, has recently been studied in various fields. The evolution of the discrete time quantum walk can be described as follows: the walker changes its spin state by the coin operator C, then takes one step left or right according to its spin state. For homogeneous quantum walk, the coin operator is independent of time and the standard deviation of the position grows linearly in time. It is quadratically faster than that in the classical random walk. In this work, we numerically study the dynamical behaviors of spreading in a one-dimensional discrete time quasiperiodic quantum walk (DTQQW). The DTQQW is that the coin operator is dependent on time and takes two different coins C() and C() arranged in generalized Fibonacci (GF) sequences. The GF sequences are constructed from A by the recursion relation: AAmBn, BA, for m, n are positive integers. They can be classified into two classes according to the wandering exponent . For 0, they belong to the first class, and for 0, they belong to the second class. For one dimensional system, the behaviors of two classes of GF systems are different either for the electronic spectrum of an electron in quasiperiodic potentials or for the quantum phase transitions of the quasiperiodic spin chains. In this paper, we discuss the cases of two different C operators (C();C()) arranged in GF sequences and find that the spreading behaviors are superdiffusion (the standard deviation of the position ~t; 0:5 1) for the two classes of GF DTQQW. For the second class of GF DTQQW, the exponent values are larger than those of the first class of GF DTQQW in the case of two identical C operators. By exploring the probability distribution in the real space, we find that for the first class of GF DTQQW, the probability distributions are almost the same for different initial states and are similar to the classical Gaussian distribution. For the probability distributions of the second class of GF DTQQW, there are two peaks at the two edges and the height of the two peaks can be different for different initial states. They are similar to the ballistic distribution of the homogeneous quantum walk. Therefore, we conclude that for the first class of GF DTQQW, the spreading behaviors are close to those of the classical random walk ( = 0:5) while for the second class of GF DTQQW, they are close to those of the homogeneous quantum walk ( = 1). This result is quite different from the characteristics of the quantum phase transitions in two classes of GF quasiperiodic quantum spin chains.

Tuned oscillatory behavior in discrete quantum walks on star clusters

A discrete time quantum walk on the star network is considered, on which the walker has a waiting probability at any time step and for any of the $N$ nodes. This contrasts with a previous continuous time analysis, in which the walker in any of the $N\ensuremath{-}1$ leaf nodes is forced to jump back to the central hub. The model amounts to considering two coin operators, one for the hub (with $N$ possible states) and another one for all leaf nodes (with two possible states). The solution depends on $N$ and $\ensuremath{\theta}$, an angle gauging the action of the coin operator on the leaf nodes. Periodic solutions are identified, which can be represented as superposition of large-period branches, sharing a relative small number of shapes and displaced by a regular interval. It is shown that the large period is very sensitive to the choice of $N$ and $\ensuremath{\theta}$. The possibility of experimental applications of this property is briefly mentioned.

Continuous limit of discrete quantum walks

Quantum walks can be defined in two quite distinct ways: discrete-time and continuous-time quantum walks (DTQWs and CTQWs). For classical random walks, there is a natural sense in which continuous-time walks are a limit of discrete-time walks. Quantum mechanically, in the discrete-time case, an additional "coin space" must be appended for the walk to have nontrivial time evolution. Continuous-time quantum walks, however, have no such constraints. This means that there is no completely straightforward way to treat a CTQW as a limit of DTQW, as can be done in the classical case. Various approaches to this problem have been taken in the past. We give a construction for walks on $d$-regular, $d$-colorable graphs when the coin flip operator is Hermitian: from a standard DTQW we construct a family of discrete-time walks with a well-defined continuous-time limit on a related graph. One can think of this limit as a {\it coined} continuous-time walk. We show that these CTQWs share some properties with coined DTQWs. In particular, we look at spatial search by a DTQW over the 2-D torus (a grid with periodic boundary conditions) of size $\sqrt{N}\times\sqrt{N}$, where it was shown \nocite{AAmbainis08} that a coined DTQW can search in time $O(\sqrt{N}\log{N})$, but a standard CTQW \nocite{Childs2004} takes $\Omega(N)$ time to search for a marked element. The continuous limit of the DTQW search over the 2-D torus exhibits the $O(\sqrt{N}\log{N})$ scaling, like the coined walk it is derived from. We also look at the effects of graph symmetry on the limiting walk, and show that the properties are similar to those of the DTQW as shown in \cite{HariKrovi2007}.

Quantum walks on graphene nanoribbons using quantum gates as coins

Both discrete and continuous quantum walks on graphs are universal for quantum computation. We define and use discrete quantum walks on the graphene honeycomb lattice to investigate the possibility of using graphene armchair and zigzag nanoribbons to implement quantum gates. The probability distribution of the quantum walker location represents the particle (electron) density distribution on the graphene lattice. We use a universal set of quantum gates as coins that drive the quantum walk and show that different quantum gates result in distinguishable particle distributions on the graphene lattice.

One-dimensional quantum walks subject to next-nearest-neighbour hopping decoherence

It is believed that the decoherence will lead to a crossover from quantum to classical for the diffusive behaviour of discrete quantum walk in the long time limit. However, a few systems with sub-ballistic diffusive behaviours have been found in some non-unitary quantum walks. In this paper, we study the one-dimensional discrete quantum walks subject to a short-range hopping decoherence, i.e. with a probability the walker could hop to next-nearest-neighbour lattices unilaterally and/or bilaterally in one time step. We find that, when the decoherence effects only come from the bilateral hopping operation, the diffusive behaviours of quantum walks are sub-ballistic and the distributions of position exhibit three peaks. These results are quite different from those of the previous non-unitary quantum walks. Our results could be used to improve the algorithmic properties of quantum walk due to its faster diffusive speed and more uniform spreading.

Quantum walks and wavepacket dynamics on a lattice with twisted photons.

The "quantum walk" has emerged recently as a paradigmatic process for the dynamic simulation of complex quantum systems, entanglement production and quantum computation. Hitherto, photonic implementations of quantum walks have mainly been based on multipath interferometric schemes in real space. We report the experimental realization of a discrete quantum walk taking place in the orbital angular momentum space of light, both for a single photon and for two simultaneous photons. In contrast to previous implementations, the whole process develops in a single light beam, with no need of interferometers; it requires optical resources scaling linearly with the number of steps; and it allows flexible control of input and output superposition states. Exploiting the latter property, we explored the system band structure in momentum space and the associated spin-orbit topological features by simulating the quantum dynamics of Gaussian wavepackets. Our demonstration introduces a novel versatile photonic platform for quantum simulations.

Scattering quantum walk search algorithm on star graph

Quantum walk is a typical quantum computing model which is receiving significant attention in recent years from theory researchers. In this paper, we prove that the two major formulations for discrete quantum walks, coined and scattering, are unitarily equivalent on star graph. We then propose a new quantum search algorithm on star graph based on the scattering quantum walk. It is shown that the temporal complexity of the algorithm is the same as that in Grover algorithm, but success probability is greater than that in Grover algorithm when the objects are more than one third of total items.

Time exponents of asymptotic entanglement of discrete quantum walk in one dimension

We report a systematic study of asymptotic behavior of entanglement between the position and coin degrees of freedom for a one-dimensional discrete quantum walk. Effects of coin bias, initial coin asymmetry and phase difference and non-locality of initial position state on the fluctuations and asymptotic value of entanglement are investigated by using Fourier approach. Fluctuations in entropy are found to die out as power law in time as t-α with α = 1/2,3/2 and 5/2 depending on the initial state parameters of the system.

Quantum walks on embedded hypercubes

It has been proved by Kempe that discrete quantum walks on the hypercube (HC) hit exponentially faster than the classical analog. The same was also observed numerically by Krovi and Brun for a slightly different property, namely, the expected hitting time. Yet, to what extent this striking result survives in more general graphs, is to date an open question. Here we tackle this question by studying the expected hitting time for quantum walks on HCs that are embedded into larger symmetric structures. By performing numerical simulations of the discrete quantum walk and deriving a general expression for the classical hitting time, we observe an exponentially increasing gap between the expected classical and quantum hitting times, not only for walks on the bare HC, but also for a large family of embedded HCs. This suggests that the quantum speedup is stable with respect to such embeddings.

Quantum simulation of bosonic-fermionic noninteracting particles in disordered systems via a quantum walk

We report on the theoretical analysis of bosonic and fermionic noninteracting systems in a discrete two-particle quantum walk affected by different kinds of disorder. We considered up to 100-step quantum walks with a spatial, temporal, and spatial-temporal disorder observing how the randomness and the wave-function symmetry nontrivially affect the final spatial probability distribution, the transport properties, and the Shannon entropy of the walkers.

Multiple quantum walkers on the line using hybrid coins: A possible tool for quantum search

In this paper discrete quantum walks with different coins used for odd and even time steps are studied. These coins are called hybrid. The calculation results are compared with the most frequently used coin, the Hadamard transform. Furthermore, quantum walks on the line which involve two or more quantum walkers with hybrid coins are studied. Quantum walks with entangled walkers and hybrid coins are also studied. The results of these calculations show that the proposed types of quantum walks can be used for quantum search, because the walker can be directed towards preferred directions and can also be confined in certain segments of the line.

WEAK LIMITS FOR QUANTUM WALKS ON THE HALF-LINE

For a discrete two-state quantum walk (QW) on the half-line with a general condition at the boundary, we formulate and prove a weak limit theorem describing the terminal behavior of its transition probabilities. In this context, localization is possible even for a walk predicated on the assumption of homogeneity. For the Hadamard walk on the half-line, the weak limit is shown to be independent of the initial coin state and to exhibit no localization.

Discrete-time quantum walk with nitrogen-vacancy centers in diamond coupled to a superconducting flux qubit

We propose a quantum-electrodynamics scheme for implementing the discrete-time, coined quantum walk with the walker corresponding to the phase degree of freedom for a quasi-magnon field realized in an ensemble of nitrogen-vacancy centres in diamond. The coin is realized as a superconducting flux qubit. Our scheme improves on an existing proposal for implementing quantum walks in cavity quantum electrodynamics by removing the cumbersome requirement of varying drive-pulse durations according to mean quasiparticle number. Our improvement is relevant to all indirect-coin-flip cavity quantum-electrodynamics realizations of quantum walks. Our numerical analysis shows that this scheme can realize a discrete quantum walk under realistic conditions.