Variational Fast Forwarding for Quantum Simulation Beyond the Coherence Time
Abstract
Trotterization-based, iterative approaches to quantum simulation are restricted to simulation times less than the coherence time of the quantum computer, which limits their utility in the near term. Here, we present a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm, called Variational Fast Forwarding (VFF), for decreasing the quantum circuit depth of quantum simulations. VFF seeks an approximate diagonalization of a short-time simulation to enable longer-time simulations using a constant number of gates. Our error analysis provides two results: (1) the simulation error of VFF scales at worst linearly in the fast-forwarded simulation time, and (2) our cost function's operational meaning as an upper bound on average-case simulation error provides a natural termination condition for VFF. We implement VFF for the Hubbard, Ising, and Heisenberg models on a simulator. Additionally, we implement VFF on Rigetti's quantum computer to demonstrate simulation beyond the coherence time. Finally, we show how to estimate energy eigenvalues using VFF.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1910.04292,
title = {Variational Fast Forwarding for Quantum Simulation Beyond the Coherence Time},
author = {Cristina Cirstoiu and Zoe Holmes and Joseph Iosue and Lukasz Cincio and Patrick J. Coles and Andrew Sornborger},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1910.04292},
year = {2020}
}
Comments
13 + 7 pages, 7 figures