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arXiv:1212.3562

State of the art and prospects for quantum computing

M. I. Dyakonov

Published Dec 14, 2012• 11 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

This is a brief review of the experimental and theoretical quantum computing. The hopes for eventually building a useful quantum computer rely entirely on the so-called "threshold theorem". In turn, this theorem is based on a number of assumptions, treated as axioms, i.e. as being satisfied exactly. Since in reality this is not possible, the prospects of scalable quantum computing will remain uncertain until the required precision, with which these assumptions should be approached, is established. Some related sociological aspects are also discussed. .

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1212.3562

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This is a brief review of the experimental and theoretical quantum computing. The hopes for eventually building a useful quantum computer rely entirely on the so-called "threshold theorem". In turn, this theorem is based on a number of assumptions, treated as axioms, i.e. as being satisfied exactly. Since in reality this is not possible, the prospects of scalable quantum computing will remain uncertain until the required precision, with which these assumptions should be approached, is established. Some related sociological aspects are also discussed. .
The hopes for scalable quantum computing rely on the “threshold theorem”: once the error per qubit per gate is below a certain value, the methods of quantum error correction allow indefinitely long quantum computations. The proof is based on a number of assumptions, which are supposed to be satisfied exactly , like axioms, e.g., zero undesired interactions between qubits, etc. However, in the physical world no continuous quantity can be exactly zero, it can only be more or less small. Thus the “error per qubit per gate” threshold must be complemented by the required precision with which each assumption should be fulfilled. In the absence of this crucial information, the prospects of scalable quantum computing remain uncertain.
The quantum computer is supposed to process information by applying unitary transformations to 2 N complex amplitudes defining the state of N qubits. A useful machine needing N~10 3 or more, the number of continuous parameters describing the state of a quantum computer at any given moment is at least 2 1000 ~10 300 which is much greater than the number of protons in the Universe. However, the theorists believe that the feasibility of large-scale quantum computing has been proved via the “threshold theorem”. Like for any theorem, the proof is based on a number of assumptions considered as axioms. However, in the physical world none of these assumptions can be fulfilled exactly. Any assumption can be only approached with some limited precision. So, the rather meaningless “error per qubit per gate” threshold must be supplemented by a list of the precisions with which all assumptions behind the threshold theorem should hold. Such a list still does not exist. The theory also seems to ignore the undesired free evolution of the quantum computer caused by the energy differences of quantum states entering any given superposition. Another important point is that the hypothetical quantum computer will be a system of 10 3 –10 6 qubits PLUS an extremely complex and monstrously sophisticated classical apparatus. This huge and strongly nonlinear system will generally exhibit instabilities and chaotic behavior.
In the last few years, theoretical study of quantum systems serving as computational devices has achieved tremendous progress. We now have strong theoretical evidence that quantum computers, if built, might be used as a dramatically powerful computational tool. This review is about to tell the story of theoretical quantum computation. I left out the developing topic of experimental realizations of the model, and neglected other closely related topics which are quantum information and quantum communication. As a result of narrowing the scope of this paper, I hope it has gained the benefit of being an almost self contained introduction to the exciting field of quantum computation. The review begins with background on theoretical computer science, Turing machines and Boolean circuits. In light of these models, I define quantum computers, and discuss the issue of universal quantum gates. Quantum algorithms, including Shor's factorization algorithm and Grover's algorithm for searching databases, are explained. I will devote much attention to understanding what the origins of the quantum computational power are, and what the limits of this power are. Finally, I describe the recent theoretical results which show that quantum computers maintain their complexity power even in the presence of noise, inaccuracies and finite precision. I tried to put all results in their context, asking what the implications to other issues in computer science and physics are. In the end of this review I make these connections explicit, discussing the possible implications of quantum computation on fundamental physical questions, such as the transition from quantum to classical physics.
The so-called "threshold" theorem says that, once the error rate per qubit per gate is below a certain value, indefinitely long quantum computation becomes feasible, even if all of the qubits involved are subject to relaxation processes, and all the manipulations with qubits are not exact. The purpose of this article, intended for physicists, is to outline the ideas of quantum error correction and to take a look at the proposed technical instruction for fault-tolerant quantum computation. It seems that the mathematics behind the threshold theorem is somewhat detached from the physical reality, and that some ideal elements are always present in the construction. This raises serious doubts about the possibility of large scale quantum computations, even as a matter of principle.
An intense effort is being made today to build a quantum computer. Instead of presenting what has been achieved, I invoke analogies from the history of science in an attempt to glimpse what the future might hold. Quantum computing is possible in principle—there are no known laws of Nature that prevent it—yet scaling up the few qubits demonstrated so far has proven to be exceedingly difficult. While this could be regarded merely as a technological or practical impediment, I argue that this difficulty might be a symptom of new laws of physics waiting to be discovered. I distinguish between ‘‘strong’’ and ‘‘weak’’ emergentist positions. The former assumes that a critical value of a parameter exists (one that is most likely related to the complexity of the states involved) at which the quantum-mechanical description breaks down, in other words, that quantum mechanics will turn out to be an incomplete description of reality. The latter assumes that quantum mechanics will remain as a universally valid theory, but that the classical resources required to build a real quantum computer scale up with the number of qubits, which hints that a limiting principle is at work.