Quantum error correction is necessary to protect logical quantum states and operations. However, no meaningful data protection can be made when the syndrome extraction is erroneous due to faulty measurement gates. Quantum data-syndrome (DS) codes are designed to protect the data qubits and syndrome bits concurrently. In this paper, we propose an efficient decoding algorithm for quantum DS codes with sparse check matrices. Based on a refined belief propagation (BP) decoding for stabilizer codes, we propose a DS-BP algorithm to handle the quaternary quantum data errors and binary syndrome bit errors. Moreover, a sparse quantum code may inherently be able to handle minor syndrome errors so that fewer redundant syndrome measurements are necessary. We demonstrate this with simulations on a quantum hypergraph-product code.
Quantum error correction is necessary to protect logical quantum states and operations. However, no meaningful data protection can be made when the syndrome extraction is erroneous due to faulty measurement gates. Quantum data-syndrome (DS) codes are designed to protect the data qubits and syndrome bits concurrently. In this paper, we propose an efficient decoding algorithm for quantum DS codes with sparse check matrices. Based on a refined belief propagation (BP) decoding for stabilizer codes, we propose a DS-BP algorithm to handle the quaternary quantum data errors and binary syndrome bit errors. Moreover, a sparse quantum code may inherently be able to handle minor syndrome errors so that fewer redundant syndrome measurements are necessary. We demonstrate this with simulations on a quantum hypergraph-product code.
Quantum stabilizer codes often face the challenge of syndrome errors due to error-prone measurements and multiple rounds of syndrome extraction are typically employed. In this paper, we consider phenomenological decoding problems, where data qubit errors may occur between two syndrome extractions, and each syndrome measurement can be faulty. To handle these diverse error sources, we define a generalized check matrix over mixed quaternary and binary alphabets to characterize their error syndromes. This generalized check matrix leads to the creation of a Tanner graph comprising quaternary and binary variable nodes, which facilitates the development of belief propagation (BP) decoding algorithms to tackle phenomenological errors. Additionally, our BP decoders are applicable to general sparse quantum codes.
Quantum stabilizer codes often struggle with syndrome errors due to measurement imperfections. Typically, multiple rounds of syndrome extraction are employed to ensure reliable error information. In this paper, we consider phenomenological decoding problems, where data qubit errors may occur between extractions, and each measurement can be faulty. We introduce generalized quantum data-syndrome codes along with a generalized check matrix that integrates both quaternary and binary alphabets to represent diverse error sources. This results in a Tanner graph with mixed variable nodes, enabling the design of belief propagation (BP) decoding algorithms that effectively handle phenomenological errors. Importantly, our BP decoders are applicable to general sparse quantum codes. Through simulations, we achieve an error threshold of more than 3% for quantum memory protected by rotated toric codes, using solely BP without post-processing. Our results indicate that d rounds of syndrome extraction are sufficient for a toric code of distance d. We observe that at high error rates, fewer rounds of syndrome extraction tend to perform better, while more rounds improve performance at lower error rates. Additionally, we propose a method to construct effective redundant stabilizer checks for single-shot error correction. Our simulations show that BP decoding remains highly effective even with a high syndrome error rate.
Quantum stabilizer codes constructed from sparse matrices have good performance and can be efficiently decoded by belief propagation (BP). A conventional BP decoding algorithm treats binary stabilizer codes as additive codes over GF(4). This algorithm has a relatively complex process of handling check-node messages, which incurs higher decoding complexity. Moreover, BP decoding of a stabilizer code usually suffers a performance loss due to the many short cycles in the underlying Tanner graph. In this paper, we propose a refined BP decoding algorithm for quantum codes with complexity roughly the same as binary BP. For a given error syndrome, this algorithm decodes to the same output as the conventional quaternary BP but the passed node-to-node messages are single-valued, unlike the quaternary BP, where multivalued node-to-node messages are required. Furthermore, the techniques of message strength normalization can naturally be applied to these single-valued messages to improve the performance. Another observation is that the message-update schedule affects the performance of BP decoding against short cycles. We show that running BP with message strength normalization according to a serial schedule (or other schedules) may significantly improve the decoding performance and error floor in computer simulation.
Codes based on sparse matrices have good performance and can be efficiently decoded by belief-propagation (BP). Decoding binary stabilizer codes needs a quaternary BP for (additive) codes over GF(4), which has a higher check-node complexity compared to a binary BP for codes over GF(2). Moreover, BP decoding of stabilizer codes suffers a performance loss from the short cycles in the underlying Tanner graph. In this paper, we propose a refined BP algorithm for decoding quantum codes by passing scalar messages. For a given error syndrome, this algorithm decodes to the same output as the conventional quaternary BP but with a check-node complexity the same as binary BP. As every message is a scalar, the message normalization can be naturally applied to improve the performance. Another observation is that the message-update schedule affects the BP decoding performance against short cycles. We show that running BP with message normalization according to a serial schedule (or other schedules) may significantly improve the decoding performance and error-floor in computer simulation.
Quantum errors are primarily detected and corrected using the measurement of syndrome information which itself is an unreliable step in practical error correction implementations. Typically, such faulty or noisy syndrome measurements are modeled as a binary measurement outcome flipped with some probability. However, the measured syndrome is in fact a discretized value of the continuous voltage or current values obtained in the physical implementation of the syndrome extraction. In this paper, we use this "soft" or analog information without the conventional discretization step to benefit the iterative decoders for decoding quantum low-density parity-check (QLDPC) codes. Syndrome-based iterative belief propagation decoders are modified to utilize the syndrome-soft information to successfully correct both data and syndrome errors simultaneously, without repeated measurements. We demonstrate the advantages of extracting the soft information from the syndrome in our improved decoders, not only in terms of comparison of thresholds and logical error rates for quasi-cyclic lifted-product QLDPC code families, but also for faster convergence of iterative decoders. In particular, the new BP decoder with noisy syndrome performs as good as the standard BP decoder under ideal syndrome.
We design low-complexity, fault-tolerant decoders for quantum low-density parity-check (QLDPC) codes with the goal of reducing decoding latency. We target two major bottlenecks of decoding under the \emph{circuit-level} noise model: (i) post-processing via order-statistics decoding (OSD), and (ii) the large number of auxiliary variable nodes commonly introduced to represent CNOT-induced correlations during syndrome extraction. Our key observation is that propagating CNOT faults (\emph{hook errors}) create \emph{stabilizer-induced} trapping sets (TSs) that are intrinsic to hypergraph-product (HGP) and lifted-product (LP) constructions. Therefore, instead of modeling each such fault with an explicit correlation node and relying on OSD to clean up the resulting failures, we design message-passing decoders that resolve the corresponding \emph{stabilizer-induced} TSs directly. We obtain these decoders by deriving QLDPC decoders from decoders for the parent classical LDPC codes and using them collectively to correct broad families of \emph{stabilizer-induced} TSs. For CNOT faults that manifest primarily as syndrome errors, we show that their effect is equivalent to a data error together with syndrome-bit measurement errors. Consequently, given repeated measurements and a decoding graph that already includes nodes representing syndrome-bit errors, no distinct variable node is needed for each CNOT fault. Using a \emph{phenomenological} Tanner graph with nodes representing only data errors and syndrome-bit errors, simulations on LP codes show a significant improvement in logical error rate relative to BP+OSD. Moreover, the improved error correction relies on low-complexity finite-state iterative decoders, targeted for fast and low-latency FPGA implementation.