61 research outputs found
From the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm to a Quantum Alternating Operator Ansatz
The next few years will be exciting as prototype universal quantum processors
emerge, enabling implementation of a wider variety of algorithms. Of particular
interest are quantum heuristics, which require experimentation on quantum
hardware for their evaluation, and which have the potential to significantly
expand the breadth of quantum computing applications. A leading candidate is
Farhi et al.'s Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm, which alternates
between applying a cost-function-based Hamiltonian and a mixing Hamiltonian.
Here, we extend this framework to allow alternation between more general
families of operators. The essence of this extension, the Quantum Alternating
Operator Ansatz, is the consideration of general parametrized families of
unitaries rather than only those corresponding to the time-evolution under a
fixed local Hamiltonian for a time specified by the parameter. This ansatz
supports the representation of a larger, and potentially more useful, set of
states than the original formulation, with potential long-term impact on a
broad array of application areas. For cases that call for mixing only within a
desired subspace, refocusing on unitaries rather than Hamiltonians enables more
efficiently implementable mixers than was possible in the original framework.
Such mixers are particularly useful for optimization problems with hard
constraints that must always be satisfied, defining a feasible subspace, and
soft constraints whose violation we wish to minimize. More efficient
implementation enables earlier experimental exploration of an alternating
operator approach to a wide variety of approximate optimization, exact
optimization, and sampling problems. Here, we introduce the Quantum Alternating
Operator Ansatz, lay out design criteria for mixing operators, detail mappings
for eight problems, and provide brief descriptions of mappings for diverse
problems.Comment: 51 pages, 2 figures. Revised to match journal pape
Physical consequences of PNP and the DMRG-annealing conjecture
Computational complexity theory contains a corpus of theorems and conjectures
regarding the time a Turing machine will need to solve certain types of
problems as a function of the input size. Nature {\em need not} be a Turing
machine and, thus, these theorems do not apply directly to it. But {\em
classical simulations} of physical processes are programs running on Turing
machines and, as such, are subject to them. In this work, computational
complexity theory is applied to classical simulations of systems performing an
adiabatic quantum computation (AQC), based on an annealed extension of the
density matrix renormalization group (DMRG). We conjecture that the
computational time required for those classical simulations is controlled
solely by the {\em maximal entanglement} found during the process. Thus, lower
bounds on the growth of entanglement with the system size can be provided. In
some cases, quantum phase transitions can be predicted to take place in certain
inhomogeneous systems. Concretely, physical conclusions are drawn from the
assumption that the complexity classes {\bf P} and {\bf NP} differ. As a
by-product, an alternative measure of entanglement is proposed which, via
Chebyshev's inequality, allows to establish strict bounds on the required
computational time.Comment: Accepted for publication in JSTA
Exploring the impact of graph locality for the resolution of MIS with neutral atom devices
In the past years, many quantum algorithms have been proposed to tackle hard
combinatorial problems. In particular, the Maximum Independent Set (MIS) is a
known NP-hard problem that can be naturally encoded in Rydberg atom arrays. By
representing a graph with an ensemble of neutral atoms one can leverage Rydberg
dynamics to naturally encode the constraints and the solution to MIS. However,
the classes of graphs that can be directly mapped ``vertex-to-atom" on standard
devices with 2D capabilities are currently limited to Unit-Disk graphs. In this
setting, the inherent spatial locality of the graphs can be leveraged by
classical polynomial-time approximation schemes (PTAS) that guarantee an
-approximate solution. In this work, we build upon recent progress
made for using 3D arrangements of atoms to embed more complex classes of
graphs. We report experimental and theoretical results which represent
important steps towards tackling combinatorial tasks on quantum computers for
which no classical efficient -approximation scheme exists.Comment: Complements the results from arXiv:2209.05164 from some of the
authors with experimental exploration and additional theoretical analysi
Approximate Approximation on a Quantum Annealer
Many problems of industrial interest are NP-complete, and quickly exhaust
resources of computational devices with increasing input sizes. Quantum
annealers (QA) are physical devices that aim at this class of problems by
exploiting quantum mechanical properties of nature. However, they compete with
efficient heuristics and probabilistic or randomised algorithms on classical
machines that allow for finding approximate solutions to large NP-complete
problems. While first implementations of QA have become commercially available,
their practical benefits are far from fully explored. To the best of our
knowledge, approximation techniques have not yet received substantial
attention. In this paper, we explore how problems' approximate versions of
varying degree can be systematically constructed for quantum annealer programs,
and how this influences result quality or the handling of larger problem
instances on given set of qubits. We illustrate various approximation
techniques on both, simulations and real QA hardware, on different seminal
problems, and interpret the results to contribute towards a better
understanding of the real-world power and limitations of current-state and
future quantum computing.Comment: Proceedings of the 17th ACM International Conference on Computing
Frontiers (CF 2020
Adiabatic Quantum State Generation and Statistical Zero Knowledge
The design of new quantum algorithms has proven to be an extremely difficult
task. This paper considers a different approach to the problem, by studying the
problem of 'quantum state generation'. This approach provides intriguing links
between many different areas: quantum computation, adiabatic evolution,
analysis of spectral gaps and groundstates of Hamiltonians, rapidly mixing
Markov chains, the complexity class statistical zero knowledge, quantum random
walks, and more.
We first show that many natural candidates for quantum algorithms can be cast
as a state generation problem. We define a paradigm for state generation,
called 'adiabatic state generation' and develop tools for adiabatic state
generation which include methods for implementing very general Hamiltonians and
ways to guarantee non negligible spectral gaps. We use our tools to prove that
adiabatic state generation is equivalent to state generation in the standard
quantum computing model, and finally we show how to apply our techniques to
generate interesting superpositions related to Markov chains.Comment: 35 pages, two figure
On quantum mean-field models and their quantum annealing
This paper deals with fully-connected mean-field models of quantum spins with
p-body ferromagnetic interactions and a transverse field. For p=2 this
corresponds to the quantum Curie-Weiss model (a special case of the
Lipkin-Meshkov-Glick model) which exhibits a second-order phase transition,
while for p>2 the transition is first order. We provide a refined analytical
description both of the static and of the dynamic properties of these models.
In particular we obtain analytically the exponential rate of decay of the gap
at the first-order transition. We also study the slow annealing from the pure
transverse field to the pure ferromagnet (and vice versa) and discuss the
effect of the first-order transition and of the spinodal limit of metastability
on the residual excitation energy, both for finite and exponentially divergent
annealing times. In the quantum computation perspective this quantity would
assess the efficiency of the quantum adiabatic procedure as an approximation
algorithm.Comment: 44 pages, 23 figure
Application of the quantum approximate optimization algorithm to combinatorial optimization problems
This licentiate thesis is an extended introduction to the accompanying papers, which encompass a study of the quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA). It is a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm for solving combinatorial optimization problems and is a promising algorithm to run on near term quantum devices. In this thesis, we will introduce the workings of the QAOA, together with some applications of it on combinatorial optimization problems
Computational complexity of the landscape I
We study the computational complexity of the physical problem of finding
vacua of string theory which agree with data, such as the cosmological
constant, and show that such problems are typically NP hard. In particular, we
prove that in the Bousso-Polchinski model, the problem is NP complete. We
discuss the issues this raises and the possibility that, even if we were to
find compelling evidence that some vacuum of string theory describes our
universe, we might never be able to find that vacuum explicitly.
In a companion paper, we apply this point of view to the question of how
early cosmology might select a vacuum.Comment: JHEP3 Latex, 53 pp, 2 .eps figure
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