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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 325 records · Page 18
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2021

Success of digital adiabatic simulation with large Trotter step

The simulation of adiabatic evolution has deep connections with adiabatic quantum computation, the quantum approximate optimization algorithm, and adiabatic state preparation. Here we address the error analysis problem in quantum simulation of adiabatic process using Trotter formulas. Here we show that with additional conditions, the circuit depth can be linear in simulation time T. The improvement comes from the observation that the fidelity error here can't be estimated by the norm distance between evolution operators. This phenomenon is termed the robustness of discretization in digital adiabatic simulation. It can be explained in three steps, from analytical and numerical evidence: (1) The fidelity error should be estimated by applying adiabatic theorem on the effective Hamiltonian instead. (2) Because of the specialty of Riemann-Lebesgue lemma, most adiabatic process is naturally robust against discretization. (3) As the Trotter step gets larger, the spectral gap of effective Hamiltonian tends to close, which results in the failure of digital adiabatic simulation.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2019

Near-optimal routing of noisy quantum states

Placement, routing, and scheduling are essential tasks for near-optimal performance of programs for noisy quantum processors. Reliable execution of an arbitrary quantum circuit on current devices requires routing methods that overcome connectivity limitations while meeting data locality requirements. However, current devices also express highly variable noise levels in both the quantum gates and quantum registers. This requires any routing algorithm to be adaptive to both the circuit and the operating conditions. We demonstrate near-optimal routing methods of noisy quantum states that minimize the overall error of data movement while also limiting the computational complexity of routing decisions. We evaluate our methods against the noise characteristics of a 20-qubit superconducting quantum processor.

Sadlier III, Ronald↗
DOE OSTI2020

Generation of thermofield double states and critical ground states with a quantum computer

Significance Our experiment prepares two types of nontrivial quantum states on a trapped ion quantum computer: the thermofield double state of the transverse-field Ising model at arbitrary temperature and the quantum critical state of the zero-temperature model. We use techniques motivated by the quantum approximate optimization algorithm, and we implement a hybrid quantum–classical optimization loop to prepare the quantum critical state. Our results pave the way for exploring strongly correlated models at finite temperature and teleportation protocols inspired by black hole physics.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2025

Quantum approximate multi-objective optimization

The goal of multi-objective optimization is to understand optimal trade-offs between competing objective functions by finding the Pareto front, that is, the set of all Pareto-optimal solutions, where no objective can be improved without degrading another one. Multi-objective optimization can be challenging classically, even if the corresponding single-objective optimization problems are efficiently solvable. Thus, multi-objective optimization represents a compelling problem class to analyze with quantum computers. Here we use a low-depth quantum approximate optimization algorithm to approximate the optimal Pareto front of certain multi-objective weighted maximum-cut problems. We demonstrate its performance on an IBM Quantum computer, as well as with matrix product state numerical simulation, and show its potential to outperform classical approaches.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2020

Classical Optimizers for Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum Devices

We present a collection of optimizers tuned for usage on Noisy Inter-mediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) devices. Optimizers have a range of applications in quantum computing, including the Variational Quantum Eigensolver (VQE) and Quantum Approximate Optimization (QAOA) algorithms. They have further uses in calibration, hyperparameter tuning, machine learning, etc. We employ the VQE algorithm as a case study. VQE is a hybrid algorithm, with a classical minimizer step driving the next evaluation on the quantum processor. While most results to date concentrated on tuning the quantum VQE circuit, our study indicates that in the presence of quantum noise the classical minimizer step is a weak link and a careful choice combined with tuning is required for correct results. We explore state-of-the-art gradient-free optimizers capable of handling noisy, black-box, cost functions and stress-test them using a quantum circuit simulation environment with noise injection capabilities on individual gates. Our results indicate that specifically tuned optimizers are crucial to obtaining valid science results on NISQ hardware, as well as projecting forward on fault tolerant circuits.

Lavrijsen, Wim↗
DOE OSTI2015

Minimum time optimal synthesis for two level quantum systems

For the time optimal problem of an invariant system on SU(2), with two independent controls and a bound on the norm of the control, the extremals of the Pontryagin maximum principle are explicit functions of time. We use this fact here to perform the optimal synthesis for these systems, i.e., to find all time optimal trajectories. Although the Lie group SU(2) is three dimensional, time optimal trajectories can be described in the unit disk of the complex plane. We find that a circular trajectory separates optimal trajectories that reach the boundary of the unit disk from the others. Inside this separatrix circle, another trajectory (the critical trajectory) plays an important role in that all optimal trajectories end at an intersection with this curve. The results allow us to find the minimum time needed to achieve a given evolution of a two level quantum system.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2022

Equivalence of quantum barren plateaus to cost concentration and narrow gorges

Optimizing parameterized quantum circuits (PQCs) is the leading approach to make use of near-term quantum computers. However, very little is known about the cost function landscape for PQCs, which hinders progress towards quantum-aware optimizers. In this work, we investigate the connection between three different landscape features that have been observed for PQCs: (1) exponentially vanishing gradients (called barren plateaus (BPs)), (2) exponential cost concentration about the mean, and (3) the exponential narrowness of minima (called narrow gorges). Here we analytically prove that these three phenomena occur together, i.e., when one occurs then so do the other two. A key implication of this result is that one can numerically diagnose BPs via cost differences rather than via the computationally more expensive gradients. More broadly, our work shows that quantum mechanics rules out certain cost landscapes (which otherwise would be mathematically possible), and hence our results could be interesting from a quantum foundations perspective.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗
DOE OSTI2022

Optimized low-depth quantum circuits for molecular electronic structure using a separable-pair approximation

We present a classically tractable model that leads to optimized low-depth quantum circuits leveraging separable-pair approximations. The obtained circuits are well suited as a baseline circuit for emerging quantum hardware and can, in the long term, provide significantly improved initial states for quantum algorithms. The associated wave functions can be represented with linear memory requirement, which allows classical optimization of the circuits and naturally defines a minimum benchmark for quantum algorithms. In this work we employ directly determined pair-natural orbitals within a basis-set-free approach. This leads to accurate representation of the one- and many-body parts for weakly correlated systems and we explicitly illustrate how the model can be integrated into other quantum algorithms for stronger correlated systems.

74 ATOMIC AND MOLECULAR PHYSICS↗
DOE OSTI2021

QAOAKit: A Toolkit for Reproducible Study, Application, and Verification of the QAOA

Understanding the best known parameters, performance, and systematic behavior of the Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) remain open research questions, even as the algorithm gains popularity. We introduce QAOAKit, a Python toolkit for the QAOA built for exploratory research. QAOAKit is a unified repository of preoptimized QAOA parameters and circuit generators for common quantum simulation frameworks. We combine, standardize, and cross-validate previously known parameters for the MaxCut problem, and incorporate this into QAOAKit. We also build conversion tools to use these parameters as inputs in several quantum simulation frameworks that can be used to reproduce, compare, and extend known results from various sources in the literature. We describe QAOAKit and provide examples of how it can be used to reproduce research results and tackle open problems in quantum optimization.

Shaydulin, Ruslan↗