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arXiv:2504.04167

CutQAS: Topology-aware quantum circuit cutting via reinforcement learning

Abhishek Sadhu, Aritra Sarkar, Akash Kundu

Published Apr 5, 2025• 0 citations
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Abstract

Simulating molecular systems on quantum processors has the potential to surpass classical methods in computational resource efficiency. The limited qubit connectivity, small processor size, and short coherence times of near-term quantum hardware constrain the applicability of quantum algorithms like QPE and VQE. Quantum circuit cutting mitigates these constraints by partitioning large circuits into smaller subcircuits, enabling execution on resource-limited devices. However, finding optimal circuit partitions remains a significant challenge, affecting both computational efficiency and accuracy. To address these limitations, in this article, we propose CutQAS, a novel framework that integrates quantum circuit cutting with quantum architecture search (QAS) to enhance quantum chemistry simulations. Our framework employs a multi-step reinforcement learning (RL) agent to optimize circuit configurations. First, an RL agent explores all possible topologies to identify an optimal circuit structure. Subsequently, a second RL agent refines the selected topology by determining optimal circuit cuts, ensuring efficient execution on constrained hardware. Through numerical simulations, we demonstrate the effectiveness of our method in improving simulation accuracy and resource efficiency. This approach presents a scalable solution for quantum chemistry applications, offering a systematic pathway to overcoming hardware constraints in near-term quantum computing.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2504.04167

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Simulating molecular systems on quantum processors has the potential to surpass classical methods in computational resource efficiency. The limited qubit connectivity, small processor size, and short coherence times of near-term quantum hardware constrain the applicability of quantum algorithms like QPE and VQE. Quantum circuit cutting mitigates these constraints by partitioning large circuits into smaller subcircuits, enabling execution on resource-limited devices. However, finding optimal circuit partitions remains a significant challenge, affecting both computational efficiency and accuracy. To address these limitations, in this article, we propose CutQAS, a novel framework that integrates quantum circuit cutting with quantum architecture search (QAS) to enhance quantum chemistry simulations. Our framework employs a multi-step reinforcement learning (RL) agent to optimize circuit configurations. First, an RL agent explores all possible topologies to identify an optimal circuit structure. Subsequently, a second RL agent refines the selected topology by determining optimal circuit cuts, ensuring efficient execution on constrained hardware. Through numerical simulations, we demonstrate the effectiveness of our method in improving simulation accuracy and resource efficiency. This approach presents a scalable solution for quantum chemistry applications, offering a systematic pathway to overcoming hardware constraints in near-term quantum computing.
Quantum circuit compilation is a critical step in realizing quantum algorithms on near-term quantum hardware. The process of translating high-level quantum algorithms into low-level gate sequences, while minimizing gate count and circuit depth, is often performed using deterministic algorithms that struggle to adapt to the diverse and often imperfect characteristics of available quantum devices. This paper proposes a novel approach to quantum circuit compilation utilizing reinforcement learning (RL). An RL agent is trained to dynamically adapt to hardware constraints, such as qubit connectivity and gate decomposition costs, optimizing circuit fidelity and execution time. The core claim is that RL can significantly improve quantum circuit compilation by introducing a dynamic and adaptive compilation process. The agent learns a policy that maps high-level quantum algorithms to optimized low-level gate sequences, effectively bridging the gap between theoretical algorithms and practical hardware execution. This work demonstrates the potential of RL to overcome the limitations of traditional deterministic compilation methods and paves the way for more efficient and robust quantum algorithm implementation.
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The practical implementation of quantum algorithms on noisy intermediate-scale quantum devices encounters operational limitations due to decoherence and other sources of noise inherent in real hardware. To mitigate these errors while preserving the original functionality of the algorithm, shorter quantum circuits are therefore preferred. This motivates the development of effective quantum circuit optimization algorithms. Learning-based approaches have emerged as a leading candidate, yet existing autonomous agents remain inefficient, spending most of their training capacity rediscovering elementary reductions that deterministic rule-based methods already handle reliably. To address this challenge, we propose a reinforcement learning framework that embeds a deterministic Commutation-and-Reduction (CR) algorithm directly into the training environment. After every agent action, the CR algorithm automatically resolves elementary commutations and cancellations, enabling the agent to focus its learning capacity on the non-trivial optimizations where reinforcement learning adds real value. Empirical evaluation across two gate sets, the universal Clifford+T basis and the CNOT+Pauli basis, shows that RL+CR produces shorter circuits than a standard RL agent at all tested scales. We demonstrate that RL trained on smaller quantum circuits can be applied to larger quantum circuits. On 20-qubit Clifford+T circuits, five times larger than the training circuits, RL+CR removes twice as many gates as standard RL. This work provides a robust approach that could accelerate the compilation and optimization processes for future fault-tolerant and utility-scale quantum systems.
In the Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) era, efficient quantum circuit synthesis is essential for optimizing limited qubit resources and mitigating noise effects. Quantum Linear Reversible Circuits (QLRCs) are a fundamental class of circuits with applications in quantum compilation or quantum error correction. They are composed exclusively of CX and SWAP gates, which are among the noisiest operations on current quantum hardware. Therefore, their efficient synthesis is pivotal for executing QLRCs on NISQ processors, which have restricted connectivity between qubits. In this direction, we introduce a Reinforcement Learning (RL)-based synthesis approach using Proximal Policy Optimization (PPO) to synthesize QLRCs on generic topologies of up to five qubits. This work extends previous work that did not handle different topologies of quantum processors. Our method dynamically adapts to hardware constraints, learning optimal or near-optimal gate decompositions. We compare our approach against Qiskit’s synthesis methods for QLRCs, demonstrating that our RL-based synthesizer consistently achieves lower CX gate depth. These results highlight the potential of RL-driven quantum circuit synthesis as a powerful alternative to traditional heuristic-based techniques, paving the way for more efficient AI-based quantum compilation strategies in the NISQ era.
The key challenge in the noisy intermediate-scale quantum era is finding useful circuits compatible with current device limitations. Variational quantum algorithms (VQAs) offer a potential solution by fixing the circuit architecture and optimizing individual gate parameters in an external loop. However, parameter optimization can become intractable, and the overall performance of the algorithm depends heavily on the initially chosen circuit architecture. Several quantum architecture search (QAS) algorithms have been developed to design useful circuit architectures automatically. In the case of parameter optimization alone, noise effects have been observed to dramatically influence the performance of the optimizer and final outcomes, which is a key line of study. However, the effects of noise on the architecture search, which could be just as critical, are poorly understood. This work addresses this gap by introducing a curriculum-based reinforcement learning QAS (CRLQAS) algorithm designed to tackle challenges in realistic VQA deployment. The algorithm incorporates (i) a 3D architecture encoding and restrictions on environment dynamics to explore the search space of possible circuits efficiently, (ii) an episode halting scheme to steer the agent to find shorter circuits, and (iii) a novel variant of simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation as an optimizer for faster convergence. To facilitate studies, we developed an optimized simulator for our algorithm, significantly improving computational efficiency in simulating noisy quantum circuits by employing the Pauli-transfer matrix formalism in the Pauli-Liouville basis. Numerical experiments focusing on quantum chemistry tasks demonstrate that CRLQAS outperforms existing QAS algorithms across several metrics in both noiseless and noisy environments.