A basic question in the theory of fault-tolerant quantum computation is to understand the fundamental resource costs for performing a universal logical set of gates on encoded qubits to arbitrary accuracy. Here we consider qubits encoded with constant space overhead (i.e. finite encoding rate) in the limit of arbitrarily large code distance d through the use of topological codes associated to triangulations of hyperbolic surfaces. We introduce explicit protocols to demonstrate how Dehn twists of the hyperbolic surface can be implemented on the code through constant depth unitary circuits, without increasing the space overhead. The circuit for a given Dehn twist consists of a permutation of physical qubits, followed by a constant depth local unitary circuit, where locality here is defined with respect to a hyperbolic metric that defines the code. Applying our results to the hyperbolic Fibonacci Turaev-Viro code implies the possibility of applying universal logical gate sets on encoded qubits through constant depth unitary circuits and with constant space overhead. Our circuits are inherently protected from errors as they map local operators to local operators while changing the size of their support by at most a constant factor; in the presence of noisy syndrome measurements, our results suggest the possibility of universal fault tolerant quantum computation with constant space overhead and time overhead of O(d/logd) . For quantum circuits that allow parallel gate operations, this yields the optimal scaling of space-time overhead known to date.
A basic question in the theory of fault-tolerant quantum computation is to understand the fundamental resource costs for performing a universal logical set of gates on encoded qubits to arbitrary accuracy. Here we consider qubits encoded with constant space overhead (i.e. finite encoding rate) in the limit of arbitrarily large code distance d through the use of topological codes associated to triangulations of hyperbolic surfaces. We introduce explicit protocols to demonstrate how Dehn twists of the hyperbolic surface can be implemented on the code through constant depth unitary circuits, without increasing the space overhead. The circuit for a given Dehn twist consists of a permutation of physical qubits, followed by a constant depth local unitary circuit, where locality here is defined with respect to a hyperbolic metric that defines the code. Applying our results to the hyperbolic Fibonacci Turaev-Viro code implies the possibility of applying universal logical gate sets on encoded qubits through constant depth unitary circuits and with constant space overhead. Our circuits are inherently protected from errors as they map local operators to local operators while changing the size of their support by at most a constant factor; in the presence of noisy syndrome measurements, our results suggest the possibility of universal fault tolerant quantum computation with constant space overhead and time overhead of O(d/logd) . For quantum circuits that allow parallel gate operations, this yields the optimal scaling of space-time overhead known to date.
A fundamental question in the theory of quantum computation is to understand the ultimate space-time resource costs for performing a universal set of logical quantum gates to arbitrary precision. Here we demonstrate that non-Abelian anyons in Turaev-Viro quantum error correcting codes can be moved over a distance of order of the code distance, and thus braided, by a constant depth local unitary quantum circuit followed by a permutation of qubits. Our gates are protected in the sense that the lengths of error strings do not grow by more than a constant factor. When applied to the Fibonacci code, our results demonstrate that a universal logical gate set can be implemented on encoded qubits through a constant depth unitary quantum circuit, and without increasing the asymptotic scaling of the space overhead. These results also apply directly to braiding of topological defects in surface codes. Our results reformulate the notion of braiding in general as an effectively instantaneous process, rather than as an adiabatic, slow process.
A fundamental question in the theory of quantum computation is to understand the ultimate space-time resource costs for performing a universal set of logical quantum gates to arbitrary precision. Here we demonstrate that non-Abelian anyons in Turaev-Viro quantum error correcting codes can be moved over a distance of order the code distance, and thus braided, by a constant depth local unitary quantum circuit followed by a permutation of qubits. Our gates are protected in the sense that the length of error strings do not grow by more than a constant factor. When applied to the Fibonacci surface code, our results demonstrate that a universal logical gate set can be implemented on encoded qubits through a constant depth unitary quantum circuit, and without increasing the asymptotic scaling of the space overhead. Our result reformulates the notion of anyon braiding as an effectively instantaneous process, rather than as an adiabatic, slow process.
We prove that constant-space-overhead fault-tolerant quantum computation can be achieved with provably strictly logarithmic time overhead, improving over the best known results with additional subpolylogarithmic factors. Our main construction uses polynomial-subrank transversal logical $\CCZ$ gates on good quantum locally testable codes to implement addressable universal computation by transferring batches of logical qubits between dense storage and active logical subspaces while reusing the same ancillary workspace. Logical $\CCZ$ gates are implemented directly by the transversal operation, so only stabilizer resource states require separate preparation. Furthermore, we give an alternative construction that also achieves purely logarithmic time overhead based on modifying the quantum Reed--Solomon magic-state distillation scheme of Nguyen and Pattison. Recursively applying a fixed distillation circuit protected by qLTCs of increasing block length eliminates the subpolylogarithmic time factor.
Realizing practical quantum computers requires quantum error correction, but the most widely implemented approach, the planar surface code, demands a substantial physical qubit overhead. Here, we demonstrate that partitioning quantum processors into manageable, flat modules with non-local inter-module connections provides a natural solution. By wiring sparse, static boundary connections between Euclidean planar modules, we construct modular hyperbolic surface and color codes, based on new families of semi-hyperbolic codes. Using modular syndrome extraction circuits and efficient neural network and matching decoders, our circuit-level simulations show that this modular memory design can reduce the physical qubit overhead by tenfold or more compared to the surface code, even under elevated inter-module seam error rates. Projecting to larger system sizes, we find modular codes with encoding rate k/n=1/16 and distance d≥22, exceeding both the rate and distance of the [[288,12,18]] two-gross bivariate bicycle code while using mostly nearest-neighbor gates within planar modules, and implying an over 30× overhead reduction relative to surface codes. We develop fault-tolerant walking circuits for implementing logic via code automorphisms, which we co-design with low-weight, highly symmetrical logical bases and a modular extractor system that is ≈4.5× smaller than the code itself. Combining these methods, our modular memory can be used as dense storage in a universal fault-tolerant architecture, unlocking the efficiency of high-rate codes without sacrificing the fabrication advantages of planar modules.
A defining feature of topologically ordered states of matter is the existence of locally indistinguishable states on spaces with nontrivial topology. These degenerate states form a representation of the mapping class group (MCG) of the space, which is generated by braids of defects or anyons, and by Dehn twists along noncontractible cycles. These operations can be viewed as fault-tolerant logical gates in the context of topological quantum error correcting codes and topological quantum computation. Here, we show that braids and Dehn twists can in general be implemented by a constant depth quantum circuit, with a depth that is independent of code distance d and system size. The circuit consists of a constant depth local quantum circuit (LQC) implementing a local geometry deformation of the quantum state, followed by a permutation on (relabeling of) the qubits. The permutation requires permuting qubits that are separated by a distance of order d; it can be implemented by collective classical motion of mobile qubits or as a constant depth circuit using long-range SWAP operations (with a range set by d) on immobile qubits. We further show that (i) applying a given braid or Dehn twist k times can be achieved with O(logk) time overhead, independent of code distance and system size, which implies an exponential speedup for certain logical gate sequences by trading space for time, and (ii) an arbitrary element of the MCG can be implemented by a constant depth (independent of d) LQC followed by a permutation, where in this case the range of interactions of the LQC grows with the number of generators in the presentation of the group element. Applying these results to certain non-Abelian quantum error correcting codes demonstrates how universal logical gate sets can be implemented on encoded qubits using only constant depth unitary circuits.
One of the most promising routes towards fault-tolerant quantum computation utilizes topological quantum error correcting codes, such as the Z2 surface code. Logical qubits can be encoded in a variety of ways in the surface code, based on either boundary defects, holes, or bulk twist defects. However, proposed fault-tolerant implementations of the Clifford group in these schemes are limited and often require unnecessary overhead. For example, the Clifford phase gate in certain planar and hole encodings has been proposed to be implemented using costly state injection and distillation protocols. In this paper, we show that within any encoding scheme for the logical qubits, we can fault tolerantly implement the full Clifford group by using joint measurements involving a single appropriately encoded logical ancilla. This allows us to provide low overhead implementations of the full Clifford group in surface and color codes. It also provides the first proposed implementations of the full Clifford group in hyperbolic codes. We further use our methods to propose state-of-the art encoding schemes for small numbers of logical qubits; for example, for code distances d=3,5,7, we propose a scheme using 60,160,308 (respectively) physical data qubits, which allow for the full logical Clifford group to be implemented on two logical qubits. To our knowledge, this is the optimal proposal to date, and thus may be useful for demonstration of fault-tolerant logical gates in small near-term quantum computers.