A central challenge in quantum machine learning is the design and training of parameterized quantum circuits (PQCs). Similar to deep learning, vanishing gradients pose immense problems in the trainability of PQCs, which have been shown to arise from a multitude of sources. One such cause are non-local loss functions, that demand the measurement of a large subset of involved qubits. To facilitate the parameter training for quantum applications using global loss functions, we propose a Sequential Hamiltonian Assembly, which iteratively approximates the loss function using local components. Aiming for a prove of principle, we evaluate our approach using Graph Coloring problem with a Varational Quantum Eigensolver (VQE). Simulation results show, that our approach outperforms conventional parameter training by 29.99% and the empirical state of the art, Layerwise Learning, by 5.12% in the mean accuracy. This paves the way towards locality-aware learning techniques, allowing to evade vanishing gradients for a large class of practically relevant problems.
A central challenge in quantum machine learning is the design and training of parameterized quantum circuits (PQCs). Similar to deep learning, vanishing gradients pose immense problems in the trainability of PQCs, which have been shown to arise from a multitude of sources. One such cause are non-local loss functions, that demand the measurement of a large subset of involved qubits. To facilitate the parameter training for quantum applications using global loss functions, we propose a Sequential Hamiltonian Assembly, which iteratively approximates the loss function using local components. Aiming for a prove of principle, we evaluate our approach using Graph Coloring problem with a Varational Quantum Eigensolver (VQE). Simulation results show, that our approach outperforms conventional parameter training by 29.99% and the empirical state of the art, Layerwise Learning, by 5.12% in the mean accuracy. This paves the way towards locality-aware learning techniques, allowing to evade vanishing gradients for a large class of practically relevant problems.
Variational quantum algorithms, such as the variational quantum eigensolver (VQE), have a very high cost due to the large number of measurement outcomes that must be acquired from the quantum device during training. This is due in large part to the use of the parameter shift rule for estimating the gradient at each step, which requires two circuit evaluations per parameter. It was recently shown that if all the gate generators in the ansatz commute with each other, then the complete gradient vector can be found from a single evaluation of an augmented circuit (Bowles et al., 2023), and this has the potential to significantly reduce the quantum cost. Unfortunately, this is quite a severe restriction, as it prevents the ansatz from having a nontrivial dynamical Lie algebra (DLA). In order to obtain a more expressive ansatz than permitted by the commutation requirement, we construct it iteratively and train it in a layerwise fashion using the parallel gradient method. For VQE training of an 8-qubit transverse field Ising model (TFIM) on an ideal simulator, we show that this approach is able to reach a lower energy using fewer circuit evaluations than the parameter shift rule with a more conventional ansatz.
The training of a parameterized model largely depends on the landscape of the underlying loss function. In particular, vanishing gradients are a central bottleneck in the scalability of variational quantum algorithms (VQAs), and are known to arise in various ways. However, a caveat of most existing gradient bound results is the requirement of t-design circuit assumptions that are typically not satisfied in practice. In this work, we loosen these assumptions altogether and derive tight upper and lower bounds on loss and gradient concentration for a large class of parameterized quantum circuits and arbitrary observables, which are significantly stronger than prior work. Moreover, we show that these bounds, as well as the variance of the loss itself, can be estimated efficiently and classically-providing practical tools to study the loss landscapes of VQA models, including verifying whether or not a circuit/observable induces barren plateaus. In particular, our results can readily be leveraged to rule out barren plateaus for a realistic class of ansätze and mixed observables, namely, observables containing a non-vanishing local term. This insight has direct implications for hybrid Quantum Generative Adversarial Networks (qGANs). We prove that designing the discriminator appropriately leads to 1-local weights that stay constant in the number of qubits, regardless of discriminator depth. This implies that qGANs with appropriately chosen generators do not suffer from barren plateaus even at scale-making them a promising candidate for applications in generative quantum machine learning. We demonstrate this result by training a qGAN to learn a 2D mixture of Gaussian distributions with up to 16 qubits, and provide numerical evidence that global contributions to the gradient, while initially exponentially small, may kick in substantially over the course of training.
Determining the ground state of a many-body Hamiltonian is a central problem across physics, chemistry, and combinatorial optimization, yet it is often classically intractable due to the exponential growth of Hilbert space with system size. Even on fault-tolerant quantum computers, quantum algorithms with convergence guarantees -- such as quantum phase estimation and quantum subspace methods -- require an initial state with sufficiently large overlap with the true ground state to be effective. Variational quantum eigensolvers (VQEs) are natural candidates for preparing such states; however, standard VQEs typically exhibit poor generalization, requiring retraining for each Hamiltonian instance, and often suffer from barren plateaus, where gradients can vanish exponentially with circuit depth and system size. To address these limitations, we propose an end-to-end representation learning framework that combines a graph autoencoder with a classical neural network to generate VQE parameters that generalize across Hamiltonian instances. By encoding interaction topology and coupling structure, the proposed model produces high-overlap initial states without instance-specific optimization. Through extensive numerical experiments on families of one- and two-local Hamiltonians, we demonstrate improved generalization and trainability, manifested as reduced test error and a significantly milder decay of gradient variance. We further show that our method substantially accelerates convergence in quantum subspace-based eigensolvers, highlighting its practical impact for downstream quantum algorithms.
Parameterized quantum circuits (PQCs) have been widely used as a machine learning model to explore the potential of achieving quantum advantages for various tasks. However, training PQCs is notoriously challenging owing to the phenomenon of plateaus and/or the existence of (exponentially) many spurious local minima. To enhance trainability, in this work we propose an efficient parameter initialization strategy with theoretical guarantees. We prove that, by reducing the initial domain of each parameter inversely proportional to the square root of the circuit depth, the magnitude of the cost gradient decays at most polynomially with respect to the qubit count and circuit depth. Our theoretical results are substantiated through numerical simulations of variational quantum eigensolver tasks. Moreover, we demonstrate that the reduced-domain initialization strategy can protect specific quantum neural networks from exponentially many spurious local minima. Our results highlight the significance of an appropriate parameter initialization strategy, offering insights to enhance the trainability and convergence of variational quantum algorithms.
Abstract Parameterized quantum circuits (PQCs) are crucial for quantum machine learning and circuit synthesis, enabling the practical implementation of complex quantum tasks. However, PQC learning has been largely confined to classical optimization methods, which suffer from issues like gradient vanishing.In this work, we introduce a nested optimization model, a hybrid approach that leverages quantum gradients to improve PQC learning for arbitrary polynomial-type cost functions. The proposed approach decomposes the learning problem into multiple subproblems, each aimed at learning the state identified by the quantum gradient using current circuit synthesis methods.By leveraging quantum gradients, the optimization procedure is free of a specific type of gradient vanishing, such as unfavorable local stationary points and barren plateaus.Specifically, with the guidance of quantum gradient, unfavorable local stationary points can be overcome by increasing the depth of the ansatz, while barren plateaus can be mitigated by constraining the optimization region.Numerically, we demonstrate the feasibility of the approach on two tasks: the Max-Cut problem and polynomial optimization. Additionally, we analyze the overheads introduced by this approach, which are primarily polynomial in the number of qubits in the system and can be controlled by adjusting the learning rate.The method can generate circuits while avoiding gradient vanishing, thus effectively optimizing the cost function.From the perspective of quantum algorithms, our model improves quantum optimization for polynomial-type cost functions, addressing the challenge of exponential sample complexity growth.
Abstract Determining the ground state of a many-body Hamiltonian is a central problem across physics, chemistry, and combinatorial optimization, yet it is often classically intractable due to the exponential growth of Hilbert space with system size. Even on fault-tolerant quantum computers, quantum algorithms with convergence guarantees—such as quantum phase estimation and quantum subspace methods—require an initial state with sufficiently large overlap with the true ground state to be effective. Variational quantum eigensolvers (VQEs) are natural candidates for preparing such states; however, standard VQEs typically exhibit poor generalization, requiring retraining for each Hamiltonian instance, and often suffer from barren plateaus, where gradients can vanish exponentially with circuit depth and system size. To address these limitations, we propose an end-to-end representation learning framework that combines a graph autoencoder with a classical neural network to generate VQE parameters that generalize across Hamiltonian instances. By encoding interaction topology and coupling structure, the proposed model produces high-overlap initial states without instance-specific optimization. Through extensive numerical experiments on families of one- and two-local Hamiltonians, we demonstrate improved generalization and trainability, manifested as reduced test error and a significantly milder decay of gradient variance. We further show that our method substantially accelerates convergence in quantum subspace-based eigensolvers, highlighting its practical impact for downstream quantum algorithms.