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Wim van Dam

Publications and source records attributed to Wim van Dam.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources
arXiv2012

Quantum algorithms for problems in number theory, algebraic geometry, and group theory

Quantum computers can execute algorithms that sometimes dramatically outperform classical computation. Undoubtedly the best-known example of this is Shor's discovery of an efficient quantum algorithm for factoring integers, whereas the same problem appears to be intractable on classical computers. Understanding what other computational problems can be solved significantly faster using quantum algorithms is one of the major challenges in the theory of quantum computation, and such algorithms motivate the formidable task of building a large-scale quantum computer. This article will review the current state of quantum algorithms, focusing on algorithms for problems with an algebraic flavor that achieve an apparent superpolynomial speedup over classical computation.

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arXiv2011

Mutually unbiased bases for quantum states defined over p-adic numbers

We describe sets of mutually unbiased bases (MUBs) for quantum states defined over the p-adic numbers Q_p, i.e. the states that can be described as elements of the (rigged) Hilbert space L2(Q_p). We find that for every prime p>2 there are at least p+1 MUBs, which is in contrast with the situation for quantum states defined over the real line R for which only 3 MUBs are known. We comment on the possible reason for the difference regarding MUBs between these two infinite dimensional Hilbert spaces.

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arXiv2011

Bipartite entangled stabilizer mutually unbiased bases as maximum cliques of Cayley graphs

We examine the existence and structure of particular sets of mutually unbiased bases (MUBs) in bipartite qudit systems. In contrast to well-known power-of-prime MUB constructions, we restrict ourselves to using maximally entangled stabilizer states as MUB vectors. Consequently, these bipartite entangled stabilizer MUBs (BES MUBs) provide no local information, but are sufficient and minimal for decomposing a wide variety of interesting operators including (mixtures of) Jamiolkowski states, entanglement witnesses and more. The problem of finding such BES MUBs can be mapped, in a natural way, to that of finding maximum cliques in a family of Cayley graphs. Some relationships with known power-of-prime MUB constructions are discussed, and observables for BES MUBs are given explicitly in terms of Pauli operators.

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arXiv2011

Noise Thresholds for Higher Dimensional Systems using the Discrete Wigner Function

For a quantum computer acting on d-dimensional systems, we analyze the computational power of circuits wherein stabilizer operations are perfect and we allow access to imperfect non-stabilizer states or operations. If the noise rate affecting the non-stabilizer resource is sufficiently high, then these states and operations can become simulable in the sense of the Gottesman-Knill theorem, reducing the overall power of the circuit to no better than classical. In this paper we find the depolarizing noise rate at which this happens, and consequently the most robust non-stabilizer states and non-Clifford gates. In doing so, we make use of the discrete Wigner function and derive facets of the so-called qudit Clifford polytope i.e. the inequalities defining the convex hull of all qudit Clifford gates. Our results for robust states are provably optimal. For robust gates we find a critical noise rate that, as dimension increases, rapidly approaches the the theoretical optimum of 100%. Some connections with the question of qudit magic state distillation are discussed.

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arXiv2009

Tight Noise Thresholds for Quantum Computation with Perfect Stabilizer Operations

We study how much noise can be tolerated by a universal gate set before it loses its quantum-computational power. Specifically we look at circuits with perfect stabilizer operations in addition to imperfect non-stabilizer gates. We prove that for all unitary single-qubit gates there exists a tight depolarizing noise threshold that determines whether the gate enables universal quantum computation or if the gate can be simulated by a mixture of Clifford gates. This exact threshold is determined by the Clifford polytope spanned by the 24 single-qubit Clifford gates. The result is in contrast to the situation wherein non-stabilizer qubit states are used; the thresholds in that case are not currently known to be tight.

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arXiv2009

On the security and degradability of Gaussian channels

We consider the notion of canonical attacks, which are the cryptographic analog of the canonical forms of a one-mode Gaussian channel. Using this notion, we explore the connections between the degradability properties of the channel and its security for quantum key distribution. Finally, we also show some relations between canonical attacks and optimal Gaussian cloners.

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arXiv2008

Quantum algorithms for algebraic problems

Quantum computers can execute algorithms that dramatically outperform classical computation. As the best-known example, Shor discovered an efficient quantum algorithm for factoring integers, whereas factoring appears to be difficult for classical computers. Understanding what other computational problems can be solved significantly faster using quantum algorithms is one of the major challenges in the theory of quantum computation, and such algorithms motivate the formidable task of building a large-scale quantum computer. This article reviews the current state of quantum algorithms, focusing on algorithms with superpolynomial speedup over classical computation, and in particular, on problems with an algebraic flavor.

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arXiv2008

Classical and Quantum Algorithms for Exponential Congruences

We discuss classical and quantum algorithms for solvability testing and finding integer solutions x,y of equations of the form af^x + bg^y = c over finite fields GF(q). A quantum algorithm with time complexity q^(3/8) (log q)^O(1) is presented. While still superpolynomial in log q, this quantum algorithm is significantly faster than the best known classical algorithm, which has time complexity q^(9/8) (log q)^O(1). Thus it gives an example of a natural problem where quantum algorithms provide about a cubic speed-up over classical ones.

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arXiv2007

Optimal phase estimation in quantum networks

We address the problem of estimating the phase phi given N copies of the phase rotation u(phi) within an array of quantum operations in finite dimensions. We first consider the special case where the array consists of an arbitrary input state followed by any arrangement of the N phase rotations, and ending with a POVM. We optimise the POVM for a given input state and fixed arrangement. Then we also optimise the input state for some specific cost functions. In all cases, the optimal POVM is equivalent to a quantum Fourier transform in an appropriate basis. Examples and applications are given.

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arXiv2005

Quantum algorithm for a generalized hidden shift problem

Consider the following generalized hidden shift problem: given a function f on {0,...,M-1} x Z_N satisfying f(b,x)=f(b+1,x+s) for b=0,1,...,M-2, find the unknown shift s in Z_N. For M=N, this problem is an instance of the abelian hidden subgroup problem, which can be solved efficiently on a quantum computer, whereas for M=2, it is equivalent to the dihedral hidden subgroup problem, for which no efficient algorithm is known. For any fixed positive epsilon, we give an efficient (i.e., poly(log N)) quantum algorithm for this problem provided M > N^epsilon. The algorithm is based on the "pretty good measurement" and uses H. Lenstra's (classical) algorithm for integer programming as a subroutine.

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arXiv2005

From optimal measurement to efficient quantum algorithms for the hidden subgroup problem over semidirect product groups

We approach the hidden subgroup problem by performing the so-called pretty good measurement on hidden subgroup states. For various groups that can be expressed as the semidirect product of an abelian group and a cyclic group, we show that the pretty good measurement is optimal and that its probability of success and unitary implementation are closely related to an average-case algebraic problem. By solving this problem, we find efficient quantum algorithms for a number of nonabelian hidden subgroup problems, including some for which no efficient algorithm was previously known: certain metacyclic groups as well as all groups of the form (Z_p)^r X| Z_p for fixed r (including the Heisenberg group, r=2). In particular, our results show that entangled measurements across multiple copies of hidden subgroup states can be useful for efficiently solving the nonabelian HSP.

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arXiv2005

Optimal measurements for the dihedral hidden subgroup problem

We consider the dihedral hidden subgroup problem as the problem of distinguishing hidden subgroup states. We show that the optimal measurement for solving this problem is the so-called pretty good measurement. We then prove that the success probability of this measurement exhibits a sharp threshold as a function of the density nu=k/log N, where k is the number of copies of the hidden subgroup state and 2N is the order of the dihedral group. In particular, for nu<1 the optimal measurement (and hence any measurement) identifies the hidden subgroup with a probability that is exponentially small in log N, while for nu>1 the optimal measurement identifies the hidden subgroup with a probability of order unity. Thus the dihedral group provides an example of a group G for which Omega(log|G|) hidden subgroup states are necessary to solve the hidden subgroup problem. We also consider the optimal measurement for determining a single bit of the answer, and show that it exhibits the same threshold. Finally, we consider implementing the optimal measurement by a quantum circuit, and thereby establish further connections between the dihedral hidden subgroup problem and average case subset sum problems. In particular, we show that an efficient quantum algorithm for a restricted version of the optimal measurement would imply an efficient quantum algorithm for the subset sum problem, and conversely, that the ability to quantum sample from subset sum solutions allows one to implement the optimal measurement.

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arXiv2005

Adiabatic Quantum Computation is Equivalent to Standard Quantum Computation

Adiabatic quantum computation has recently attracted attention in the physics and computer science communities, but its computational power was unknown. We describe an efficient adiabatic simulation of any given quantum algorithm, which implies that the adiabatic computation model and the conventional quantum computation model are polynomially equivalent. Our result can be extended to the physically realistic setting of particles arranged on a two-dimensional grid with nearest neighbor interactions. The equivalence between the models provides a new vantage point from which to tackle the central issues in quantum computation, namely designing new quantum algorithms and constructing fault tolerant quantum computers. In particular, by translating the main open questions in the area of quantum algorithms to the language of spectral gaps of sparse matrices, the result makes these questions accessible to a wider scientific audience, acquainted with mathematical physics, expander theory and rapidly mixing Markov chains.

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arXiv2005

Implausible Consequences of Superstrong Nonlocality

This Letter looks at the consequences of so-called 'superstrong nonlocal correlations', which are hypothetical violations of Bell/CHSH inequalities that are stronger than quantum mechanics allows, yet weak enough to prohibit faster-than-light communication. It is shown that the existence of maximally superstrong correlated bits implies that all distributed computations can be performed with a trivial amount of communication, i.e. with one bit. If one believes that Nature does not allow such a computational 'free lunch', then the result in the Letter gives a reason why superstrong correlation are indeed not possible.

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arXiv2004

The statistical strength of nonlocality proofs

There exist numerous proofs of Bell's theorem, stating that quantum mechanics is incompatible with local realistic theories of nature. Here we define the strength of such nonlocality proofs in terms of the amount of evidence against local realism provided by the corresponding experiments. This measure tells us how many trials of the experiment we should perform in order to observe a substantial violation of local realism. Statistical considerations show that the amount of evidence should be measured by the Kullback-Leibler or relative entropy divergence between the probability distributions over the measurement outcomes that the respective theories predict. The statistical strength of a nonlocality proof is thus determined by the experimental implementation of it that maximizes the Kullback-Leibler divergence from experimental (quantum mechanical) truth to the set of all possible local theories. An implementation includes a specification with which probabilities the different measurement settings are sampled, and hence the maximization is done over all such setting distributions. We analyze two versions of Bell's nonlocality proof (his original proof and an optimized version by Peres), and proofs by Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt, Hardy, Mermin, and Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger. We find that the GHZ proof is at least four and a half times stronger than all other proofs, while of the two-party proofs, the one of CHSH is the strongest.

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arXiv2004

Quantum Computing and Zeroes of Zeta Functions

A possible connection between quantum computing and Zeta functions of finite field equations is described. Inspired by the 'spectral approach' to the Riemann conjecture, the assumption is that the zeroes of such Zeta functions correspond to the eigenvalues of finite dimensional unitary operators of natural quantum mechanical systems. The notion of universal, efficient quantum computation is used to model the desired quantum systems. Using eigenvalue estimation, such quantum circuits would be able to approximately count the number of solutions of finite field equations with an accuracy that does not appear to be feasible with a classical computer. For certain equations (Fermat hypersurfaces) it is show that one can indeed model their Zeta functions with efficient quantum algorithms, which gives some evidence in favor of the proposal of this article.

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arXiv2003

Quantum Computing Discrete Logarithms with the Help of a Preprocessed State

An alternative quantum algorithm for the discrete logarithm problem is presented. The algorithm uses two quantum registers and two Fourier transforms whereas Shor's algorithm requires three registers and four Fourier transforms. A crucial ingredient of the algorithm is a quantum state that needs to be constructed before we can perform the computation. After one copy of this state is created, the algorithm can be executed arbitrarily many times.

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