Several quantum hardware platforms, while being unable to perform fully fault-tolerant quantum computation, can still be operated as analogue quantum simulators for addressing many-body problems. However, due to the presence of errors, it is not clear to what extent those devices can provide us with an advantage with respect to classical computers. In this work, we make progress on this problem for noisy analogue quantum simulators computing physically relevant properties of many-body systems both in equilibrium and undergoing dynamics. We first formulate a system-size independent notion of stability against extensive errors, which we prove for Gaussian fermion models, as well as for a restricted class of spin systems. Remarkably, for the Gaussian fermion models, our analysis shows the stability of critical models which have long-range correlations. Furthermore, we analyze how this stability may lead to a quantum advantage, for the problem of computing the thermodynamic limit of many-body models, in the presence of a constant error rate and without any explicit error correction.
Several quantum hardware platforms, while being unable to perform fully fault-tolerant quantum computation, can still be operated as analogue quantum simulators for addressing many-body problems. However, due to the presence of errors, it is not clear to what extent those devices can provide us with an advantage with respect to classical computers. In this work, we make progress on this problem for noisy analogue quantum simulators computing physically relevant properties of many-body systems both in equilibrium and undergoing dynamics. We first formulate a system-size independent notion of stability against extensive errors, which we prove for Gaussian fermion models, as well as for a restricted class of spin systems. Remarkably, for the Gaussian fermion models, our analysis shows the stability of critical models which have long-range correlations. Furthermore, we analyze how this stability may lead to a quantum advantage, for the problem of computing the thermodynamic limit of many-body models, in the presence of a constant error rate and without any explicit error correction.
The rapid development in hardware for quantum computing and simulation has led to much interest in problems where these devices can exceed the capabilities of existing classical computers and known methods. Approaching this for problems that go beyond testing the performance of a quantum device is an important step, and quantum simulation of many-body quench dynamics is one of the most promising candidates for early practical quantum advantage. We analyse the requirements for quantitatively reliable quantum simulation beyond the capabilities of existing classical methods for analogue quantum simulators with neutral atoms in optical lattices and trapped ions. Considering the primary sources of error in analogue devices and how they propagate after a quench in studies of the Hubbard or long-range transverse field Ising model, we identify the level of error expected in quantities we extract from experiments. We conclude for models that are directly implementable that regimes of practical quantum advantage are attained in current experiments with analogue simulators. We also identify the hardware requirements to reach the same level of accuracy with future fault-tolerant digital quantum simulation. Verification techniques are already available to test the assumptions we make here, and demonstrating these in experiments will be an important next step.
Abstract The rapid development in hardware for quantum computing and simulation has led to much interest in problems where these devices can exceed the capabilities of existing classical computers and known methods. Approaching this for problems that go beyond testing the performance of a quantum device is an important step, and quantum simulation of many-body quench dynamics is one of the most promising candidates for early practical quantum advantage. We analyse the requirements for quantitatively reliable quantum simulation beyond the capabilities of existing classical methods for analogue quantum simulators with neutral atoms in optical lattices and trapped ions. Considering the primary sources of error in analogue devices and how they propagate after a quench in studies of the Hubbard or long-range transverse field Ising model, we identify the level of error expected in quantities we extract from experiments. We conclude for models that are directly implementable that regimes of practical quantum advantage are attained in current experiments with analogue simulators. We also identify the hardware requirements to reach the same level of accuracy with future fault-tolerant digital quantum simulation. Verification techniques are already available to test the assumptions we make here, and demonstrating these in experiments will be an important next step.
Many-body open quantum systems, described by Lindbladian master equations, are a rich class of physical models that display complex equilibrium and out-of-equilibrium phenomena which remain to be understood. In this paper, we theoretically analyze noisy analog quantum simulation of geometrically local open quantum systems and provide evidence that this problem both is hard to simulate on classical computers and could be approximately solved on near-term quantum devices. First, given a noiseless quantum simulator, we show that the dynamics of local observables and the fixed-point expectation values of rapidly mixing local observables in geometrically local Lindbladians can be obtained to a precision of ϵ in time that is poly ( ϵ − 1 ) and uniform in system size. Furthermore, we establish that the quantum simulator would provide a superpolynomial advantage, in run-time scaling with respect to the target precision and either the evolution time (when simulating dynamics) or the Lindbladian’s decay rate (when simulating fixed points), over any classical algorithm for these problems, assuming BQP ≠ BPP . We then consider the presence of noise in the quantum simulator in the form of additional geometrically local Lindbladian terms. We show that the simulation tasks considered in this paper are stable to errors; i.e., they can be solved to a noise-limited, but system-size independent, precision. Finally, we establish that, assuming BQP ≠ BPP , there are stable geometrically local Lindbladian simulation problems such that, as the noise rate on the simulator is reduced, classical algorithms must take time superpolynomially longer in the inverse noise rate to attain the same precision as the analog quantum simulator.
Quantum computing promises to revolutionize several scientific and technological domains through fundamentally new ways of processing information. Among its most compelling applications is digital quantum simulation, where quantum computers are used to replicate the behavior of other quantum systems. This could enable the study of problems that are otherwise intractable on classical computers, transforming fields such as quantum chemistry, condensed matter physics, and materials science. Despite this potential, realizations of practical quantum advantage for relevant problems are hindered by imperfections of current devices. This also affects quantum hardware based on superconducting circuits which is among the most advanced and scalable platforms. The envisaged long-term solution of fault-tolerant quantum computers that correct their own errors remains out of reach mainly due to the associated qubit number overhead. As a result, the field has developed strategies that combine quantum and classical resources, exploit hardware-native operations, and employ error mitigation techniques to extract meaningful results from noisy data. This doctoral thesis contributes to this broader effort by exploring methods for advancing quantum simulation across the full computational stack, including hardware-level innovations, refined techniques for noise modeling and error mitigation, and algorithmic improvements enabled by efficient measurement processing.
Quantum mechanical problems are among the hardest to simulate and, in some cases, remain intractable even for the most powerful computers. Quantum computing has emerged as a new technological platform to address such challenges, with rapid advances in recent years. Yet, current quantum devices remain noisy and limited in scale. Hence, it is essential to identify classically hard problems of practical interest and tractable with existing quantum devices. Among potential applications, the real-time simulation of quantum systems is one of the most promising to deliver an early, practical quantum advantage. This doctoral thesis is therefore centered around simulating quantum dynamics on quantum devices. We first present an overview of the most relevant quantum algorithms for quantum dynamics, highlighting respective advantages and limitations. Further, we identify relevant problems within quantum dynamics that could benefit from quantum simulation in the near future. Second, we propose a method for benchmarking hardware and error mitigation algorithms that is based on well-understood theoretical results and suffers from no scaling issues. The resulting quality metric is intuitive and transferable to other applications. We successfully implement the scheme on up to 133 qubits, demonstrating coherent evolution up to a two-qubit gate depth of 28, featuring 1396 two-qubit gates, before noise becomes prevalent. Third, we propose a novel variant of probabilistic error amplification to implement open quantum dynamics, relying on characterizing and altering hardware noise to mimic the system-environment interaction under study. Lastly, we present two studies on state preparation and phase classification: first, a hybrid algorithm to prepare ground states of electron-phonon systems; second, a quantum machine learning-based approach to distinguish phases in previously prepared quantum states.
Exploiting the coherence and entanglement of quantum many-qubit states, quantum computing can significantly surpass classical algorithms, making it possible to factor large numbers, solve linear equations, simulate many-body quantum systems, etc., in a reasonable time. With the rapid development of quantum computing hardware, many attention has been drawn to explore how quantum computers could go beyond the limit of classical computation. Owing to the need of a universal fault-tolerant quantum computer for many existing quantum algorithms, such as Shor’s factoring algorithm, and considering the limit of near-term quantum devices with small qubit numbers and short coherence times, many recent works focused on the exploration of demonstrating quantum advantages using noisy intermediate-scaled quantum devices and shallow circuits, and hence some sampling problems have been proposed as the candidates for quantum advantage demonstration. This review summarizes quantum advantage problems that are realizable on current quantum hardware. We focus on two notable problems—random circuit simulation and boson sampling—and consider recent theoretical and experimental progresses. After the respective demonstrations of these two types of quantum advantages on superconducting and optical quantum platforms, we expect current and near-term quantum devices could be employed for demonstrating quantum advantages in general problems.