arXiv subjects

Christoph Hellings

Publications and source records attributed to Christoph Hellings.

24 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2020

Improving the Performance of Deep Quantum Optimization Algorithms with Continuous Gate Sets

Variational quantum algorithms are believed to be promising for solving computationally hard problems and are often comprised of repeated layers of quantum gates. An example thereof is the quantum approximate optimization algorithm (QAOA), an approach to solve combinatorial optimization problems on noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) systems. Gaining computational power from QAOA critically relies on the mitigation of errors during the execution of the algorithm, which for coherence-limited operations is achievable by reducing the gate count. Here, we demonstrate an improvement of up to a factor of 3 in algorithmic performance as measured by the success probability, by implementing a continuous hardware-efficient gate set using superconducting quantum circuits. This gate set allows us to perform the phase separation step in QAOA with a single physical gate for each pair of qubits instead of decomposing it into two C$Z$-gates and single-qubit gates. With this reduced number of physical gates, which scales with the number of layers employed in the algorithm, we experimentally investigate the circuit-depth-dependent performance of QAOA applied to exact-cover problem instances mapped onto three and seven qubits, using up to a total of 399 operations and up to 9 layers. Our results demonstrate that the use of continuous gate sets may be a key component in extending the impact of near-term quantum computers.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2020

Mixed Monotonic Programming for Fast Global Optimization

While globally optimal solutions to many convex programs can be computed efficiently in polynomial time, this is, in general, not possible for nonconvex optimization problems. Therefore, locally optimal approaches or other efficient suboptimal heuristics are usually applied for practical implementations. However, there is also a strong interest in computing globally optimal solutions of nonconvex problems in offline simulations in order to benchmark the faster suboptimal algorithms. Global solutions often rely on monotonicity properties. A common approach is to reformulate problems into a canonical monotonic optimization problem where the monotonicity becomes evident, but this often comes at the cost of nested optimizations, increased numbers of variables, and/or slow convergence. The framework of mixed monotonic programming (MMP) proposed in this paper avoids such performance-deteriorating reformulations by revealing hidden monotonicity properties directly in the original problem formulation. By means of a wide range of application examples from the area of signal processing for communications (including energy efficiency for green communications, resource allocation in interference networks, scheduling for fairness and quality of service, as well as beamformer design in multiantenna systems), we demonstrate that the novel MMP approach leads to tremendous complexity reductions compared to state-of-the-art methods for global optimization. However, the framework is not limited to optimizing communication systems, and we expect that similar speed-ups can be obtained for optimization problems from other areas of research as well.

cs.IT↗

arXiv2020

Improper Signaling versus Time-Sharing in the Two-User Gaussian Interference Channel with TIN

So-called improper complex signals have been shown to be beneficial in the single-antenna two-user Gaussian interference channel under the assumptions that all input signals are Gaussian and that we treat interference as noise (TIN). This result has been obtained under a restriction to pure strategies without time-sharing, and it was extended to the case where the rates, but not the transmit powers, may be averaged over several transmit strategies. In this paper, we drop such restrictions and discuss the most general case of coded time-sharing, where both the rates and the powers may be averaged. Since coded time-sharing can in general not be expressed by means of a convex hull of the rate region, we have to account for the possibility of time-sharing already during the optimization of the transmit strategy. By means of a novel channel enhancement argument, we prove a surprising result: proper signals are optimal if coded time-sharing is allowed. In addition to establishing this result, we present an algorithm to compute the corresponding achievable rate region.

cs.IT↗

arXiv2019

Two-User SIMO Interference Channel with TIN: Improper Signaling versus Time-Sharing

In the two-user Gaussian interference channel with Gaussian inputs and treating interference as noise (TIN), improper complex signals can be beneficial if time-sharing is not allowed or if only the data rates are averaged over several transmit strategies (convex hull formulation). On the other hand, proper (circularly symmetric) signals have recently been shown to be optimal if coded time-sharing is considered, i.e., if both the data rates and the transmit powers are averaged. In this paper, we show that both conclusions remain the same if single-input multiple-output (SIMO) systems with multiple antennas at the receivers are considered. The proof for the case with coded time-sharing is via a novel enhanced channel concept for the two-user SIMO interference channel, which turns out to deliver a tight outer bound to the TIN rate region with coded time-sharing. The result for the case without coded time-sharing is demonstrated by studying specific examples in which a newly proposed composite real gradient-projection method for improper signaling can outperform the globally optimal proper signaling strategy. In addition, we discuss how the achievable TIN rate region with coded time-sharing can be computed numerically.

cs.IT↗

arXiv2019

Maximizing the Partial Decode-and-Forward Rate in the Gaussian MIMO Relay Channel

It is known that circularly symmetric Gaussian signals are the optimal input signals for the partial decode-and-forward (PDF) coding scheme in the Gaussian multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relay channel, but there is currently no method to find the optimal covariance matrices nor to compute the optimal achievable PDF rate since the optimization is a non-convex problem in its original formulation. In this paper, we show that it is possible to find a convex reformulation of the problem by means of an approximation and a primal decomposition. We derive an explicit solution for the inner problems as well as an explicit gradient for the outer problem, so that the efficient cutting-plane method can be applied for solving the outer problem. As the accuracy of this provably convergent algorithm might be impaired by the previous approximation, we additionally propose a modified algorithm, for which we cannot give a converge guarantee, but which provides rigorous upper and lower bounds to the optimum of the original rate maximization. In numerical simulations, these bounds become tight in all considered instances of the problem, showing that the proposed method manages to find the global optimum in all these instances.

cs.IT↗

arXiv2014

The Optimal Input Distribution for Partial Decode-and-Forward in the MIMO Relay Channel

This paper considers the partial decode-and-forward (PDF) strategy for the Gaussian multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) relay channel. Unlike for the decode-and-forward (DF) strategy or point-to-point (P2P) transmission, for which Gaussian channel inputs are known to be optimal, the input distribution that maximizes the achievable PDF rate for the Gaussian MIMO relay channel has remained unknown so far. For some special cases, e.g., for relay channels where the optimal PDF strategy reduces to DF or P2P transmission, it could be deduced that Gaussian inputs maximize the PDF rate. For the general case, however, the problem has remained open until now. In this work, we solve this problem by proving that the maximum achievable PDF rate for the Gaussian MIMO relay channel is always attained by Gaussian channel inputs. Our proof relies on the channel enhancement technique, which was originally introduced by Weingarten et al. to derive the (private message) capacity region of the Gaussian MIMO broadcast channel. By combining this technique with a primal decomposition approach, we first establish that jointly Gaussian source and relay inputs maximize the achievable PDF rate for the aligned Gaussian MIMO relay channel. Subsequently, we use a limiting argument to extend this result from the aligned to the general Gaussian MIMO relay channel.

cs.IT↗