Quadratic Speedup Research Articles

Maximal coin-walker entanglement in a ballistic quantum walk

We report the position-inhomogeneous quantum walk (IQW) can be utilized to produce the maximal high dimensional entanglement while maintaining the quadratic speedup spread of the wave-function. Our calculations show that the maximal coin-walker entanglement can be generated in any odd steps or asymptotically in even steps, and the nearly maximal entanglement can be obtained in even steps after $2$. We implement the IQW by a stable resource-saving time-bin optical network, in which a polarization Sagnac loop is employed to realize the precisely tunable phase shift. Our approach opens up an efficient way for high-dimensional entanglement engineering as well as promotes investigations on the role of coin-walker interactions in QW based applications.

Deterministic Grover search with a restricted oracle

Grover's quantum search algorithm provides a quadratic quantum advantage over classical algorithms across a broad class of unstructured search problems. The original protocol is probabilistic, returning the desired result with significant probability on each query, but in general, requiring several iterations of the algorithm. We present a modified version to return the correct result with certainty without having user control over the quantum search oracle. Our deterministic, two-parameter "D2p" protocol utilizes generalized phase rotations replacing the phase inversions after a standard oracle query. The D2p protocol achieves a 100% success rate in no more than one additional iteration compared to the optimal number of steps in the original Grover's search enabling the same quadratic speed up. We also provide a visualization using the Bloch sphere for enhanced geometric intuition.

Quantum computations for disambiguation and question answering

Automatic text processing is now a mature discipline in computer science, and so attempts at advancements using quantum computation have emerged as the new frontier, often under the term of quantum natural language processing. The main challenges consist in finding the most adequate ways of encoding words and their interactions on a quantum computer, considering hardware constraints, as well as building algorithms that take advantage of quantum architectures, so as to show improvement on the performance of natural language tasks. In this paper, we introduce a new framework that starts from a grammar that can be interpreted by means of tensor contraction, to build word representations as quantum states that serve as input to a quantum algorithm. We start by introducing an operator measurement to contract the representations of words, resulting in the representation of larger fragments of text. We then go on to develop pipelines for the tasks of sentence meaning disambiguation and question answering that take advantage of quantum features. For the first task, we show that our contraction scheme deals with syntactically ambiguous phrases storing the various different meanings in quantum superposition, a solution not available on a classical setting. For the second task, we obtain a question representation that contains all possible answers in equal quantum superposition, and we implement Grover’s quantum search algorithm to find the correct answer, agnostic to the specific question, an implementation with the potential of delivering a result with quadratic speedup.

Fast quantum algorithm for protein structure prediction in hydrophobic-hydrophilic model

In its unfolded form, a protein is a linear sequence of amino acids. Protein structure prediction attempts to find the native conformation for a given protein, which has potential applications in drug and vaccine development. Classically, protein structure prediction is an NP-complete, unsolved computational problem. Quantum computing however promises to improve upon the performance of classical algorithms. Here we develop a quantum algorithm in hydrophobic-hydrophilic model on two-dimensional square lattice to solve the problem for any sequence of length N amino acids with a quadratic speedup over its classical counterpart. This speedup is achieved using Grover's quantum search algorithm. The algorithm can be used for amino acid sequences of arbitrary length. It consists of three stages: (1) preparation of a superposition state that encodes all possible 22(N−1) conformations, (2) calculation of coordinates and energy for each possible conformation in parallel, and (3) finding the conformation with the minimal energy. The asymptotic complexity with regard to space is O(N3), while the obtained speedup is quadratic compared to the classical counterpart. We have successfully simulated the algorithm on the IBM Quantum's qasm simulator using Qiskit SDK. Also, we have further confirmed the correctness of the results by calculating theoretical probability of finding the right conformation.

Performance analysis of a hybrid agent for quantum-accessible reinforcement learning

In the last decade quantum machine learning has provided fascinating and fundamental improvements to supervised, unsupervised and reinforcement learning (RL). In RL, a so-called agent is challenged to solve a task given by some environment. The agent learns to solve the task by exploring the environment and exploiting the rewards it gets from the environment. For some classical task environments, an analogue quantum environment can be constructed which allows to find rewards quadratically faster by applying quantum algorithms. In this paper, we analytically analyze the behavior of a hybrid agent which combines this quadratic speedup in exploration with the policy update of a classical agent. This leads to a faster learning of the hybrid agent compared to the classical agent. We demonstrate that if the classical agent needs on average ⟨J⟩ rewards and ⟨T⟩cl epochs to learn how to solve the task, the hybrid agent will take epochs on average. Here, α s and α o denote constants depending on details of the quantum search and are independent of the problem size. Additionally, we prove that if the environment allows for maximally α o k max sequential coherent interactions, e.g. due to noise effects, an improvement given by ⟨T⟩q ≈ α o ⟨T⟩cl/(4k max) is still possible.

Weakly measured while loops: peeking at quantum states

A while loop tests a termination condition on every iteration. On a quantum computer, such measurements perturb the evolution of the algorithm. We define a while loop primitive using weak measurements, offering a trade-off between the perturbation caused and the amount of information gained per iteration. This trade-off is adjusted with a parameter set by the programmer. We provide sufficient conditions that let us determine, with arbitrarily high probability, a worst-case estimate of the number of iterations the loop will run for. As an example, we solve Grover’s search problem using a while loop and prove the quadratic quantum speed-up is maintained.

Bermudan option pricing by quantum amplitude estimation and Chebyshev interpolation

Pricing of financial derivatives, in particular early exercisable options such as Bermudan options, is an important but heavy numerical task in financial institutions, and its speed-up will provide a large business impact. Recently, applications of quantum computing to financial problems have been started to be investigated. In this paper, we first propose a quantum algorithm for Bermudan option pricing. This method performs the approximation of the continuation value, which is a crucial part of Bermudan option pricing, by Chebyshev interpolation, using the values at interpolation nodes estimated by quantum amplitude estimation. In this method, the number of calls to the oracle to generate underlying asset price paths scales as widetilde{O}(epsilon ^{-1}), where ϵ is the error tolerance of the option price. This means the quadratic speed-up compared with classical Monte Carlo-based methods such as least-squares Monte Carlo, in which the oracle call number is widetilde{O}(epsilon ^{-2}).

Faster quantum and classical SDP approximations for quadratic binary optimization

We give a quantum speedup for solving the canonical semidefinite programming relaxation for binary quadratic optimization. This class of relaxations for combinatorial optimization has so far eluded quantum speedups. Our methods combine ideas from quantum Gibbs sampling and matrix exponent updates. A de-quantization of the algorithm also leads to a faster classical solver. For generic instances, our quantum solver gives a nearly quadratic speedup over state-of-the-art algorithms. Such instances include approximating the ground state of spin glasses and MaxCut on Erdös-Rényi graphs. We also provide an efficient randomized rounding procedure that converts approximately optimal SDP solutions into approximations of the original quadratic optimization problem.

Quantum amplitude-amplification operators

Quantum search algorithms have been shown to deliver quadratic speedups over classical ones. The authors propose a generalized form of such algorithms through the use of ``quantum amplitude-amplification operators'' (QAAOs), with a goal of implementing them on near-term quantum devices. They demonstrate three-qubit examples on cloud-based quantum computing services, and use their framework to distinguish between exact and fixed-point quantum search algorithms.

Robust Quantum Search with Uncertain Number of Target States.

The quantum search algorithm is one of the milestones of quantum algorithms. Compared with classical algorithms, it shows quadratic speed-up when searching marked states in an unsorted database. However, the success rates of quantum search algorithms are sensitive to the number of marked states. In this paper, we study the relation between the success rate and the number of iterations in a quantum search algorithm of given , where M is the number of marked state and N is the number of items in the dataset. We develop a robust quantum search algorithm based on Grover–Long algorithm with some uncertainty in the number of marked states. The proposed algorithm has the same query complexity as the Grover’s algorithm, and shows high tolerance of the uncertainty in the ratio . In particular, for a database with an uncertainty in the ratio , our algorithm will find the target states with a success rate no less than .

Block-encoding-based quantum algorithm for linear systems with displacement structures

Matrices with the displacement structures of circulant, Toeplitz, and Hankel types as well as matrices with structures generalizing these types are omnipresent in computations of sciences and engineering. In this paper we present efficient and memory-reduced quantum algorithms for solving linear systems with such structures by devising an approach to implement the block-encodings of these structured matrices. More specifically, by decomposing $n\ifmmode\times\else\texttimes\fi{}n$ dense matrices into linear combinations of displacement matrices, we first deduce the parametrized representations of the matrices with displacement structures so that they can be treated similarly. With such representations, we then construct $\ensuremath{\epsilon}$-approximate block-encodings of these structured matrices in two different data access models, i.e., the black-box model and the quantum random access memory (QRAM) data structure model. It is shown the quantum linear system solvers based on the proposed block-encodings provide a quadratic speedup with respect to the dimension over classical algorithms in the black-box model and an exponential speedup in the QRAM data structure model. In particular, these linear system solvers subsume known results with significant improvements and also can motivate new instances where there was no specialized quantum algorithm before. As an application, one of the quantum linear system solvers is applied to the linear prediction of time series, which justifies the claimed quantum speedup is achievable for problems of practical interest.

Coherent parallelization of universal classical computation

Previously, higher-order Hamiltonians (HoH) had been shown to offer an advantage in both metrology and quantum energy storage. Here, we axiomatize a model of computation that allows us to consider such Hamiltonians for the purposes of computation. From this axiomatic model, we formally prove that an HoH-based algorithm can gain up to a quadratic speed-up over classical sequential algorithms—for any possible classical computation. We show how our axiomatic model is grounded in the same physics as that used in HoH-based quantum advantage for metrology and battery charging. Thus we argue that any advance in implementing HoH-based quantum advantage in those scenarios can be co-opted for the purpose of speeding up computation.

On solving classes of positive-definite quantum linear systems with quadratically improved runtime in the condition number

Quantum algorithms for solving the Quantum Linear System (QLS) problem are among the most investigated quantum algorithms of recent times, with potential applications including the solution of computationally intractable differential equations and speed-ups in machine learning. A fundamental parameter governing the efficiency of QLS solvers is κ, the condition number of the coefficient matrix A, as it has been known since the inception of the QLS problem that for worst-case instances the runtime scales at least linearly in κ [Harrow, Hassidim and Lloyd, PRL 103, 150502 (2009)]. However, for the case of positive-definite matrices classical algorithms can solve linear systems with a runtime scaling as κ, a quadratic improvement compared to the the indefinite case. It is then natural to ask whether QLS solvers may hold an analogous improvement. In this work we answer the question in the negative, showing that solving a QLS entails a runtime linear in κ also when A is positive definite. We then identify broad classes of positive-definite QLS where this lower bound can be circumvented and present two new quantum algorithms featuring a quadratic speed-up in κ: the first is based on efficiently implementing a matrix-block-encoding of A−1, the second constructs a decomposition of the form A=LL† to precondition the system. These methods are widely applicable and both allow to efficiently solve BQP-complete problems.

Classical and Quantum Algorithms for Assembling a Text from a Dictionary

We study algorithms for solving the problem of assembling a text (long string) from a dictionary (a sequence of small strings). The problem has an application in bioinformatics and has a connection with the sequence assembly method for reconstructing a long deoxyribonucleic-acid (DNA) sequence from small fragments. The problem is assembling a string t of length n from strings s1,...,sm. Firstly, we provide a classical (randomized) algorithm with running time Õ(nL0.5 + L) where L is the sum of lengths of s1,...,sm. Secondly, we provide a quantum algorithm with running time Õ(nL0.25 + √mL). Thirdly, we show the lower bound for a classical (randomized or deterministic) algorithm that is Ω(n+L). So, we obtain the quadratic quantum speed-up with respect to the parameter L; and our quantum algorithm have smaller running time comparing to any classical (randomized or deterministic) algorithm in the case of non-constant length of strings in the dictionary.

QiBAM: Approximate Sub-String Index Search on Quantum Accelerators Applied to DNA Read Alignment

With small-scale quantum processors transitioning from experimental physics labs to industrial products, these processors in a few years are expected to scale up and be more robust for efficiently computing important algorithms in various fields. In this paper, we propose a quantum algorithm to address the challenging field of data processing for genome sequence reconstruction. This research describes an architecture-aware implementation of a quantum algorithm for sub-sequence alignment. A new algorithm named QiBAM (quantum indexed bidirectional associative memory) is proposed, which uses approximate pattern-matching based on Hamming distances. QiBAM extends the Grover’s search algorithm in two ways, allowing: (1) approximate matches needed for read errors in genomics, and (2) a distributed search for multiple solutions over the quantum encoding of DNA sequences. This approach gives a quadratic speedup over the classical algorithm. A full implementation of the algorithm is provided and verified using the OpenQL compiler and QX Simulator framework. Our implementation represents a first exploration towards a full-stack quantum accelerated genome sequencing pipeline design.

F-Divergences and Cost Function Locality in Generative Modelling with Quantum Circuits.

Generative modelling is an important unsupervised task in machine learning. In this work, we study a hybrid quantum-classical approach to this task, based on the use of a quantum circuit born machine. In particular, we consider training a quantum circuit born machine using f-divergences. We first discuss the adversarial framework for generative modelling, which enables the estimation of any f-divergence in the near term. Based on this capability, we introduce two heuristics which demonstrably improve the training of the born machine. The first is based on f-divergence switching during training. The second introduces locality to the divergence, a strategy which has proved important in similar applications in terms of mitigating barren plateaus. Finally, we discuss the long-term implications of quantum devices for computing f-divergences, including algorithms which provide quadratic speedups to their estimation. In particular, we generalise existing algorithms for estimating the Kullback–Leibler divergence and the total variation distance to obtain a fault-tolerant quantum algorithm for estimating another f-divergence, namely, the Pearson divergence.

Quantum Walk on the Generalized Birkhoff Polytope Graph.

We study discrete-time quantum walks on generalized Birkhoff polytope graphs (GBPGs), which arise in the solution-set to certain transportation linear programming problems (TLPs). It is known that quantum walks mix at most quadratically faster than random walks on cycles, two-dimensional lattices, hypercubes, and bounded-degree graphs. In contrast, our numerical results show that it is possible to achieve a greater than quadratic quantum speedup for the mixing time on a subclass of GBPG (TLP with two consumers and m suppliers). We analyze two types of initial states. If the walker starts on a single node, the quantum mixing time does not depend on m, even though the graph diameter increases with it. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first example of its kind. If the walker is initially spread over a maximal clique, the quantum mixing time is , where ϵ is the threshold used in the mixing times. This result is better than the classical mixing time, which is .

Optimization of 16-Element Quantum Search on IBMQ

Unstructured searching, which is to find the marked element from a given unstructured data set, is a widely studied problem in computer science. It is well known that Grover algorithm provides a quadratic speedup to solve unstructured search problem compared with the classical algorithm. This algorithm has received a lot of attention due to the strong versatility. In this manuscript, we report experimental results of searching a unique target from 16 elements on five different quantum devices of IBM quantum Experience (IBMQ). We first implement the original Grover algorithm on these devices. However, the experiment probability of success of finding the correct target is almost the same as random choice. We then optimize the quantum circuit size of the search algorithm. The oracle operator and diffusion operator are two of the most costly operators in Grover algorithm. For the 16-element quantum search algorithm, both the oracle operator and diffusion operator consist of a triple controlled [Formula: see text] gate ([Formula: see text]) and some single-qubit gates. So we optimize the implementation of the [Formula: see text] gate according to the qubits layout of different quantum devices. On the ibmq_santiago, the experimental success rate of the 16-element quantum search algorithm is increased to [Formula: see text] by the optimization, which is better than all the published experiments implemented on IBMQ devices. For other IBMQ devices, the experimental success rate of 16-element quantum search also has been significantly improved. We then try to further reduce the size of the quantum circuit by modifying the Grover algorithm, with a tolerable loss of the theoretical success probability. On ibmq_quito, the experimental success rate is further improved from 25.23% to 27.56% after optimization. These experimental results show the importance of circuit optimization and algorithm optimization in the Noisy-Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) era.

Quantum-enhanced analysis of discrete stochastic processes

Discrete stochastic processes (DSP) are instrumental for modeling the dynamics of probabilistic systems and have a wide spectrum of applications in science and engineering. DSPs are usually analyzed via Monte-Carlo methods since the number of realizations increases exponentially with the number of time steps, and importance sampling is often required to reduce the variance. We propose a quantum algorithm for calculating the characteristic function of a DSP, which completely defines its probability distribution, using the number of quantum circuit elements that grows only linearly with the number of time steps. The quantum algorithm reduces the Monte-Carlo sampling to a Bernoulli trial while taking all stochastic trajectories into account. This approach guarantees the optimal variance without the need for importance sampling. The algorithm can be further furnished with the quantum amplitude estimation algorithm to provide quadratic speed-up in sampling. The Fourier approximation can be used to estimate an expectation value of any integrable function of the random variable. Applications in finance and correlated random walks are presented. Proof-of-principle experiments are performed using the IBM quantum cloud platform.

Quantum-accessible reinforcement learning beyond strictly epochal environments

In recent years, quantum-enhanced machine learning has emerged as a particularly fruitful application of quantum algorithms, covering aspects of supervised, unsupervised and reinforcement learning. Reinforcement learning offers numerous options of how quantum theory can be applied, and is arguably the least explored, from a quantum perspective. Here, an agent explores an environment and tries to find a behavior optimizing some figure of merit. Some of the first approaches investigated settings where this exploration can be sped-up, by considering quantum analogs of classical environments, which can then be queried in superposition. If the environments have a strict periodic structure in time (i.e. are strictly episodic), such environments can be effectively converted to conventional oracles encountered in quantum information. However, in general environments, we obtain scenarios that generalize standard oracle tasks. In this work, we consider one such generalization, where the environment is not strictly episodic, which is mapped to an oracle identification setting with a changing oracle. We analyze this case and show that standard amplitude-amplification techniques can, with minor modifications, still be applied to achieve quadratic speed-ups. In addition, we prove that an algorithm based on Grover iterations is optimal for oracle identification even if the oracle changes over time in a way that the “rewarded space” is monotonically increasing. This result constitutes one of the first generalizations of quantum-accessible reinforcement learning.