arXiv subjects

Cole Comfort

Publications and source records attributed to Cole Comfort.

17 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Finite Observations, Infinite Behaviour: bicategorical semantics for stateful monoidal processes

Time-dependent processes are often described by machines with an internal state which is updated as time evolves. An external observer cannot see this state and learns about a process only through finite observations of its inputs and outputs, each of which imposes a constraint on the trajectories the process can exhibit. We introduce a semantic construction in which two stateful processes have the same behaviour when they have the same constraints, as determined by finite observations, independent of their internal state. The construction is defined over any preorder-enriched monoidal category with a compatible notion of discarding, which we call a discard bicategory, capturing partial, non-deterministic, probabilistic, and quantum processes. The resulting category of behaviours provides a functorial semantics for free feedback categories in the sense of Katis, Sabadini, and Walters. For non-deterministic systems, we prove a categorified compactness theorem: every compatible family of finite observations between compact Hausdorff spaces extends uniquely and functorially to an infinite closed relation. Restricted to affine relations over finite fields, the compactness theorem recovers Willems' notion of behaviour for linear time-invariant systems.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2026

The Delayed Stabilizer ZX-Calculus

Many stabilizer quantum error-correcting codes are built from a finite pattern repeated across space or time, such as lattice codes, translation-invariant graph states, and quantum convolutional codes. Ordinary stabilizer ZX-diagrams capture only finite truncations of such systems, obscuring the repeated structure that defines them. We introduce the delayed stabilizer ZX-calculus, a finite graphical language for these infinite, translation-invariant processes. It extends the odd-prime-dimensional stabilizer ZX-calculus with a single new generator, the delay, which feeds data from one time step to the next. We equip the calculus with two semantics. In the first semantics, we interpret the behaviour of a delayed ZX-diagram as an equivalence class of sequences of quantum channels; where two sequences are identified if they have the same information content. We show that the behaviour of a delayed ZX-diagram uniquely determines an infinite stabilizer group. In the second semantics, we interpret the delay as a formal variable, encoding the translation-invariant families of Pauli operators as generating functions. This allows us to represent a delayed ZX-diagram in terms of a tableau of generating functions, from which the infinite stabilizer group can be recovered. Finally, we give a complete axiomatization of the delayed stabilizer ZX-calculus, featuring generalised Euler decomposition and colour change rules. Using generalised forms of local complementation and pivoting, we reduce every diagram to a unique normal form. This establishes soundness, universality, and completeness for the generating tableau semantics.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2026

A dataflow programming framework for linear optical distributed quantum computing

Photonic systems offer a promising platform for interconnecting quantum processors and enabling scalable, networked architectures. Designing and verifying such architectures requires a unified formalism that integrates linear algebraic reasoning with probabilistic and control-flow structures. In this work, we introduce a graphical framework for distributed quantum computing that brings together linear optics, the ZX-calculus, and dataflow programming. Our language supports the formal analysis and optimization of distributed protocols involving both qubits and photonic modes, with explicit interfaces for classical control and feedforward, all expressed within a synchronous dataflow model with discrete-time dynamics. Within this setting, we classify entangling photonic fusion measurements, show how their induced Pauli errors can be corrected via a novel flow structure for fusion networks, and establish correctness proofs for new repeat-until-success protocols enabling arbitrary fusions. Layer by layer, we construct qubit architectures incorporating practical optical components such as beam splitters, switches, and photon sources, with graphical proofs that they are deterministic and support universal quantum computation. Together, these results establish a foundation for verifiable compilation and automated optimization in networked quantum computing.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2025

From Moore-Penrose to Markov via Gauss

Markov categories are the central framework for categorical probability theory. Many important concepts from probability theory can be formalized in terms of Markov categories. In particular, conditional probability distributions and Bayes' theorem are captured via the notion of conditionals in a Markov category. Gaussian probability theory gives an example of a Markov category with conditionals, where the conditionals can be computed using the Moore-Penrose inverse. In this paper, we introduce the Gauss construction on a Moore-Penrose dagger additive category, producing a Markov category with conditionals. Applying the Gauss construction to the category of real matrices recaptures the Gaussian probability theory example, while applying it to the category of complex (resp. quaternionic) matrices gives us new Markov categories of proper complex (resp. quaternionic) Gaussian conditional distributions. Moreover, we also characterize all possible conditionals in the Gauss construction.

math.CT↗

arXiv2025

Denotational semantics for stabiliser quantum programs

The stabiliser fragment of quantum theory is a foundational building block for quantum error correction and the fault-tolerant compilation of quantum programs. In this article, we develop a sound, universal and complete denotational semantics for stabiliser operations which include measurement, classically-controlled Pauli operators, and affine classical operations, in which quantum error-correcting codes are first-class objects. The operations are interpreted as certain affine relations over finite fields. This offers a conceptually motivated and computationally-tractable alternative to the standard operator-algebraic semantics of quantum programs (whose time complexity grows exponentially as the state space increases in size). We demonstrate the power of the resulting semantics by describing a small, proof-of-concept assembly language for stabiliser programs with fully-abstract denotational semantics.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2024

Complete equational theories for classical and quantum Gaussian relations

We give generators and relations for the hypergraph props of Gaussian relations and positive affine Lagrangian relations. The former extends Gaussian probabilistic processes by completely-uninformative priors, and the latter extends Gaussian quantum mechanics with infinitely-squeezed states. These presentations are given by adding a generator to the presentation of real affine relations and of real affine Lagrangian relations which freely codiscards effects, as well as certain rotations. The presentation of positive affine Lagrangian relations provides a rigorous justification for many common yet informal calculations in the quantum physics literature involving infinite-squeezing. Our presentation naturally extends Menicucci et al.'s graph-theoretic representation of Gaussian quantum states with a representation for Gaussian transformations. Using this graphical calculus, we also give a graphical proof of Braunstein and Kimble's continuous-variable quantum teleportation protocol. We also interpret the LOv-calculus, a diagrammatic calculus for reasoning about passive linear-optical quantum circuits in our graphical calculus. Moreover, we show how our presentation allows for additional optical operations such as active squeezing.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2024

Graphical Symplectic Algebra

We give complete presentations for the dagger-compact props of affine Lagrangian and coisotropic relations over an arbitrary field. This provides a unified family of graphical languages for both affinely constrained classical mechanical systems, as well as odd-prime-dimensional stabiliser quantum circuits. To this end, we present affine Lagrangian relations by a particular class of undirected coloured graphs. In order to reason about composite systems, we introduce a powerful scalable notation where the vertices of these graphs are themselves coloured by graphs. In the setting of stabiliser quantum mechanics, this scalable notation gives an extremely concise description of graph states, which can be composed via ``phased spider fusion.'' Likewise, in the classical mechanical setting of electrical circuits, we show that impedance matrices for reciprocal networks are presented in essentially the same way.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2023

The Algebra for Stabilizer Codes

There is a bijection between odd prime dimensional qudit pure stabilizer states modulo invertible scalars and affine Lagrangian subspaces of finite dimensional symplectic $\mathbb{F}_p$-vector spaces. In the language of the stabilizer formalism, full rank stabilizer tableaux are exactly the bases for affine Lagrangian subspaces. This correspondence extends to an isomorphism of props: the composition of stabilizer circuits corresponds to the relational composition of affine subspaces spanned by the tableaux, the tensor product corresponds to the direct sum. In this paper, we extend this correspondence between stabilizer circuits and tableaux to the mixed setting; regarding stabilizer codes as affine coisotropic subspaces (again only in odd prime qudit dimension/for qubit CSS codes). We show that by splitting the projector for a stabilizer code we recover the error detection protocol and the error correction protocol with affine classical processing power.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Coend Optics for Quantum Combs

We compare two possible ways of defining a category of 1-combs, the first intensionally as coend optics and the second extensionally as a quotient by the operational behaviour of 1-combs on lower-order maps. We show that there is a full and bijective on objects functor quotienting the intensional definition to the extensional one and give some sufficient conditions for this functor to be an isomorphism of categories. We also show how the constructions for 1-combs can be extended to produce polycategories of n-combs with similar results about when these polycategories are equivalent. The extensional definition is of particular interest in the study of quantum combs and we hope this work might produce further interest in the usage of optics for modelling these structures in quantum theory.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2021

A Graphical Calculus for Lagrangian Relations

Symplectic vector spaces are the phase spaces of linear mechanical systems. The symplectic form describes, for example, the relation between position and momentum as well as current and voltage. The category of linear Lagrangian relations between symplectic vector spaces is a symmetric monoidal subcategory of relations which gives a semantics for the evolution -- and more generally linear constraints on the evolution -- of various physical systems. We give a new presentation of the category of Lagrangian relations over an arbitrary field as a `doubled' category of linear relations. More precisely, we show that it arises as a variation of Selinger's CPM construction applied to linear relations, where the covariant orthogonal complement functor plays the role of conjugation. Furthermore, for linear relations over prime fields, this corresponds exactly to the CPM construction for a suitable choice of dagger. We can furthermore extend this construction by a single affine shift operator to obtain a category of affine Lagrangian relations. Using this new presentation, we prove the equivalence of the prop of affine Lagrangian relations with the prop of qudit stabilizer theory in odd prime dimensions. We hence obtain a unified graphical language for several disparate process theories, including electrical circuits, Spekkens' toy theory, and odd-prime-dimensional stabilizer quantum circuits.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2021

Distributive Laws, Spans and the ZX-Calculus

We modularly build increasingly larger fragments of the ZX-calculus by modularly adding new generators and relations, at each point, giving some concrete semantics in terms of some category of spans. This is performed using Lack's technique of composing props via distributive laws, as well as the technique of pushout cubes of Zanasi. We do this for the fragment of the ZX-calculus with only the black $\pi$-phase (and no Hadamard gate) as well as well as the fragment which additionally has the and gate as a generator (which is equivalent to the natural number H-box fragment of the ZH-calculus). In the former case, we show that this is equivalent to the full subcategory of spans of (possibly empty) free, finite dimensional affine $\mathbb F_2$-vector spaces, where the objects are the non-empty affine vector spaces. In the latter case, we show that this is equivalent to the full subcategory of spans of finite sets where the objects are powers of the two element set. Because these fragments of the ZX-calculus have semantics in terms of full subcategories of categories of spans, they can not be presented by distributive laws over groupoids. Instead, we first construct their subcategories of partial isomorphisms via distributive laws over all isomorphims with subobjects adjoined. After which, the full subcategory of spans are obtained by freely adjoining units and counits the the semi-Frobenius structures given by the diagonal and codiagonal maps.

math.CT↗

arXiv2020

Sheet diagrams for bimonoidal categories

Bimonoidal categories (also known as rig categories) are categories with two monoidal structures, one of which distributes over the other. We formally define sheet diagrams, a graphical calculus for bimonoidal categories that was informally introduced by Staton. Sheet diagrams are string diagrams drawn on a branching surface, which is itself an extruded string diagram. Our main result is a soundness and completeness theorem of the usual form for graphical calculi: we show that sheet diagrams form the free bimonoidal category on a signature.

math.CT↗

arXiv2020

The ZX&-calculus: A complete graphical calculus for classical circuits using spiders

We give a complete presentation for the fragment, ZX&, of the ZX-calculus generated by the Z and X spiders (corresponding to copying and addition) along with the not gate and the and gate. To prove completeness, we freely add a unit and counit to the category TOF generated by the Toffoli gate and ancillary bits, showing that this yields the full subcategory of finite ordinals and functions with objects powers of two; and then perform a two way translation between this category and ZX&. A translation to some extension of TOF, as opposed to some fragment of the ZX-calculus, is a natural choice because of the multiplicative nature of the Toffoli gate. To this end, we show that freely adding counits to the semi-Frobenius algebras of a discrete inverse category is the same as constructing the Cartesian completion. In particular, for a discrete inverse category, the category of classical channels, the Cartesian completion and adding counits all produce the same category. Therefore, applying these constructions to TOF produces the full subcategory of finite ordinals and partial maps with objects powers of two. By glueing together the free counit completion and the free unit completion, this yields "qubit multirelations."

cs.LO↗

arXiv2019

Circuit Relations for Real Stabilizers: Towards TOF+H

The real stabilizer fragment of quantum mechanics was shown to have a complete axiomatization in terms of the angle-free fragment of the ZX-calculus. This fragment of the ZX-calculus---although abstractly elegant---is stated in terms of identities, such as spider fusion which generally do not have interpretations as circuit transformations. We complete the category CNOT generated by the controlled not gate and the computational ancillary bits, presented by circuit relations, to the real stabilizer fragment of quantum mechanics. This is performed first, by adding the Hadamard gate and the scalar sqrt 2 as generators. We then construct translations to and from the angle-free fragment of the ZX-calculus, showing that they are inverses. We then discuss how this could potentially lead to a complete axiomatization, in terms of circuit relations, for the approximately universal fragment of quantum mechanics generated by the Toffoli gate, Hadamard gate and computational ancillary bits.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2019

The Category TOF

We provide a complete set of identities for the symmetric monoidal category, TOF, generated by the Toffoli gate and computational ancillary bits. We do so by demonstrating that the functor which evaluates circuits on total points, is an equivalence into the full subcategory of sets and partial isomorphisms with objects finite powers of the two element set. The structure of the proof builds -- and follows the proof of Cockett et al.-- which provided a full set of identities for the cnot gate with computational ancillary bits. Thus, first it is shown that TOF is a discrete inverse category in which all of the identities for the cnot gate hold; and then a normal form for the restriction idempotents is constructed which corresponds precisely to subobjects of the total points of TOF. This is then used to show that TOF is equivalent to FPinj2, the full subcategory of sets and partial isomorphisms in which objects have cardinality a power of 2.

cs.LO↗

arXiv2018

Dagger linear logic for categorical quantum mechanics

Categorical quantum mechanics exploits the dagger compact closed structure of finite dimensional Hilbert spaces, and uses the graphical calculus of string diagrams to facilitate reasoning about finite dimensional processes. A significant portion of quantum physics, however, involves reasoning about infinite dimensional processes, and it is well-known that the category of all Hilbert spaces is not compact closed. Thus, a limitation of using dagger compact closed categories is that one cannot directly accommodate reasoning about infinite dimensional processes. A natural categorical generalization of compact closed categories, in which infinite dimensional spaces can be modelled, is *-autonomous categories and, more generally, linearly distributive categories. This article starts the development of this direction of generalizing categorical quantum mechanics. An important first step is to establish the behaviour of the dagger in these more general settings. Thus, these notes simultaneously develop the categorical semantics of multiplicative dagger linear logic. The notes end with the definition of a mixed unitary category. It is this structure which is subsequently used to extend the key features of categorical quantum mechanics.

math.CT↗

arXiv2018

The Category CNOT

We exhibit a complete set of identities for CNOT, the symmetric monoidal category generated by the controlled-not gate, the swap gate, and the computational ancillae. We prove that CNOT is a discrete inverse category. Moreover, we prove that CNOT is equivalent to the category of partial isomorphisms of finitely-generated non-empty commutative torsors of characteristic 2. Equivalently this is the category of affine partial isomorphisms between finite-dimensional Z2 vector spaces.

cs.LO↗