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arXiv:2502.09514

Continuous-Variable Quantum MacWilliams Identities

Ansgar G. Burchards

Published Feb 13, 2025• 0 citations
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Abstract

We derive bounds on general quantum error correcting codes against the displacement noise channel. The bounds limit the distances attainable by codes and also apply in an approximate setting. Our main result is a quantum analogue of the classical Cohn-Elkies bound on sphere packing densities attainable in Euclidean space. We further derive a quantum version of Levenshtein's sphere packing bound and argue that Gottesman--Kitaev--Preskill (GKP) codes based on the $E_8$ and Leech lattices achieve optimal distances. The main technical tool is a continuous-variable version of the quantum MacWilliams identities, which we introduce. The identities relate a pair of weight distributions which can be obtained for any two trace-class operators. General properties of these weight distributions are discussed, along with several examples.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2502.09514

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We derive bounds on general quantum error correcting codes against the displacement noise channel. The bounds limit the distances attainable by codes and also apply in an approximate setting. Our main result is a quantum analogue of the classical Cohn-Elkies bound on sphere packing densities attainable in Euclidean space. We further derive a quantum version of Levenshtein's sphere packing bound and argue that Gottesman--Kitaev--Preskill (GKP) codes based on the E8E_8E8​ and Leech lattices achieve optimal distances. The main technical tool is a continuous-variable version of the quantum MacWilliams identities, which we introduce. The identities relate a pair of weight distributions which can be obtained for any two trace-class operators. General properties of these weight distributions are discussed, along with several examples.
We construct the three-point continuous-variable (CV) quantum MacWilliams identity, extending the two-point framework of Burchards, and give its closed-form integral kernel. Its configuration space carries a symplectic invariant with no classical counterpart, which encodes the GKP quantization condition and a three-point sign phase. Using the identity, we derive the semidefinite-programming bounds it supports on the dimension of CV quantum error-correcting codes, and we prove, in two collapse theorems, that the three-point apparatus does not improve on the two-point bound. For GKP lattice codes the three-point optimum equals the Burchards two-point linear-programming optimum identically. This is an exact determination of the lattice three-point optimum, so the E8E_8E8​ and Leech magic functions saturate it rather than beat it. For general bosonic codes a completely-positive reformulation bypasses the positivity obstruction that rules out the natural factored-form constructions; the phase-sign condition together with Choi positivity then force the three-point term to vanish. We certify this collapse for radial Choi forms on the first eight Laguerre levels at one mode, and leave the full trace-class cone open. Both collapses have a single cause with no classical analogue, the code projector: it orients the bound correctly but also removes the full positivity that powers the classical three-point improvement.
We examine general Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) codes for continuous-variable quantum error correction, including concatenated GKP codes, through the lens of lattice theory, in order to better understand the structure of this class of stabilizer codes. We derive formal bounds on code parameters, show how different decoding strategies are precisely related, propose new ways to obtain GKP codes by means of glued lattices and the tensor product of lattices and point to natural resource savings that have remained hidden in recent approaches. We present general results that we illustrate through examples taken from different classes of codes, including scaled self-dual GKP codes and the concatenated surface-GKP code.
The Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (gkp) quantum error-correcting code attracts much attention in continuous variable (CV) quantum computation and CV quantum communication due to the simplicity of error-correcting routines and the high tolerance against Gaussian errors. Since the gkp code state should be regarded as a limit of physically meaningful approximate ones, various approximations have been developed until today, but explicit relations among them are still unclear. In this paper, we rigorously prove the equivalence of these approximate gkp codes with an explicit correspondence of the parameters. We also propose a standard form of the approximate code states in the position representation, which enables us to derive closed-form expressions for the Wigner function, inner products, and the average photon number in terms of the theta functions. Our results serve as fundamental tools for further analyses of fault-tolerant quantum computation and channel coding using approximate gkp codes.
We examine general Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) codes for continuous-variable quantum error correction, including concatenated GKP codes, through the lens of lattice theory, in order to better understand the structure of this class of stabilizer codes. We derive formal bounds on code parameters, show how different decoding strategies are precisely related, propose new ways to obtain GKP codes by means of glued lattices and the tensor product of lattices and point to natural resource savings that have remained hidden in recent approaches. We present general results that we illustrate through examples taken from different classes of codes, including scaled self-dual GKP codes and the concatenated surface-GKP code.
Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) codes encode a qubit in displaced phase-space combs of a continuous-variable (CV) quantum system and are useful for correcting a variety of high-weight photonic errors. Here we propose atomic ensemble analogs of the single-mode CV GKP code by using the quantum central limit theorem to pull back the phase-space structure of a CV system to the compact phase space of a quantum spin system. We study the optimal recovery performance of these codes under error channels described by stochastic relaxation and isotropic ballistic dephasing processes using the diversity combining approach for calculating channel fidelity. We find that the spin GKP codes outperform other spin system codes such as cat codes or binomial codes. Our spin GKP codes based on the two-axis countertwisting interaction and superpositions of SU(2) coherent states are direct spin analogs of the finite-energy CV GKP codes, whereas our codes based on one-axis twisting do not yet have well-studied CV analogs. A state preparation scheme for the spin GKP codes is proposed which uses the linear-combination-of-unitaries method, applicable to both the CV and spin GKP settings. Finally, we discuss a fault-tolerant approximate gate set for quantum computing with spin-GKP-encoded qubits, obtained by translating gates from the CV GKP setting using the quantum central limit theorem.
The Gottesman-Kitaev-Preskill (GKP) codes are known to achieve optimal rates under displacement noise and pure-loss channels, which establishes theoretical foundations for its optimality. However, such optimal rates are only known to be achieved at a discrete set of noise strengths with the current self-dual symplectic lattice construction. In this work, we develop a new coding strategy using concatenated continuous variable-discrete variable encodings to go beyond past results and establish GKP’s optimal rate over all noise strengths. In particular, for displacement noise, the rate is obtained through a constructive approach by concatenating GKP codes with a quantum polar code and analog decoding. For a pure-loss channel, we prove the existence of capacity-achieving GKP codes through a random coding approach. These results highlight the capability of concatenation-based GKP codes and provides new methods for constructing good GKP lattices.