Coherent optical implementations of the fast Fourier transform and their comparison to the optical implementation of the quantum Fourier transform

Optical structures to implement the discrete Fourier transform (DFT) and fast Fourier transform (FFT) algorithms for discretely sampled data sets are considered. In particular, the decomposition of the FFT algorithm into the basic Butterfly operations is described, as this allows the algorithm to be fully implemented by the successive coherent addition and subtraction of two wavefronts (the subtraction being performed after one has been appropriately phase shifted), so facilitating a simple and robust hardware implementation based on waveguided hybrid devices as employed in coherent optical detection modules. Further, a comparison is made to the optical structures proposed for the optical implementation of the quantum Fourier transform and they are shown to be very similar

Curvature fluctuations on asymptotically de Sitter spacetimes via the semiclassical Einstein's equations

It has been proposed recently to consider in the framework of cosmology an extension of the semiclassical Einstein's equations in which the Einstein tensor is considered as a random function. This paradigm yields a hierarchy of equations between the $n$-point functions of the quantum, normal ordered, stress energy-tensor and those associated to the stochastic Einstein tensor. Assuming that the matter content is a conformally coupled massive scalar field on de Sitter spacetime, this framework has been applied to compute the power spectrum of the quantum fluctuations and to show that it is almost scale-invariant. We test the robustness and the range of applicability of this proposal by applying it to a less idealized, but physically motivated, scenario, namely we consider Friedmann-Robertson-Walker spacetimes which behave only asymptotically in the past as a de Sitter spacetime. We show in particular that, under this new assumption and independently from any renormalization freedom, the power spectrum associated to scalar perturbations of the metric behaves consistently with an almost scale-invariant power spectrum.Comment: 23 page

Massive Parallel Quantum Computer Simulator

We describe portable software to simulate universal quantum computers on massive parallel computers. We illustrate the use of the simulation software by running various quantum algorithms on different computer architectures, such as a IBM BlueGene/L, a IBM Regatta p690+, a Hitachi SR11000/J1, a Cray X1E, a SGI Altix 3700 and clusters of PCs running Windows XP. We study the performance of the software by simulating quantum computers containing up to 36 qubits, using up to 4096 processors and up to 1 TB of memory. Our results demonstrate that the simulator exhibits nearly ideal scaling as a function of the number of processors and suggest that the simulation software described in this paper may also serve as benchmark for testing high-end parallel computers.Comment: To appear in Comp. Phys. Com

Toward an architecture for quantum programming

It is becoming increasingly clear that, if a useful device for quantum computation will ever be built, it will be embodied by a classical computing machine with control over a truly quantum subsystem, this apparatus performing a mixture of classical and quantum computation. This paper investigates a possible approach to the problem of programming such machines: a template high level quantum language is presented which complements a generic general purpose classical language with a set of quantum primitives. The underlying scheme involves a run-time environment which calculates the byte-code for the quantum operations and pipes it to a quantum device controller or to a simulator. This language can compactly express existing quantum algorithms and reduce them to sequences of elementary operations; it also easily lends itself to automatic, hardware independent, circuit simplification. A publicly available preliminary implementation of the proposed ideas has been realized using the C++ language.Comment: 23 pages, 5 figures, A4paper. Final version accepted by EJPD ("swap" replaced by "invert" for Qops). Preliminary implementation available at: http://sra.itc.it/people/serafini/quantum-computing/qlang.htm