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arXiv:2608.22032

qiskit-qudits: A Qiskit Extension for Simulating Qudit Circuits

Francesco Pudda

quant-phSubmitted Aug 22, 2026• Announced Aug 25, 2026• 0 citations

Abstract

qiskit-qudits is a Qiskit extension that simulates d-level qudits by encoding each one into m = ceil(log_2 d) qubits. Qudit gates are exposed as ordinary Qiskit Gate and ControlledGate subclasses, and operations that are not unitary gates (measurement, reset, barrier, state preparation) as dedicated Instruction subclasses dispatched through a dedicated apply() hook; every gate carries both a dense encoded unitary (via NumPy's array protocol) and a qubit-level definition. Because d need not be a power of two, the encoded Hilbert space is generally larger than the logical one; the library resolves this by the identity-padding convention, in which every gate acts as the identity on the unphysical part of the encoded space. When every operand dimension is a power of two, gates decompose into a fixed, transpiler-recognisable cascade of standard qubit gates; otherwise the library falls back to exact dense unitary synthesis, so that dimensions 2 <= d <= 16 are supported exactly, not only powers of two. This paper describes the software's circuit model, gate hierarchy, decomposition strategy, and measurement/decoding machinery, states its limitations, and verifies the implementation numerically: the qudit QFT against the discrete Fourier transform for both power-of-two and non-power-of-two d, extending the check of the underlying theory paper, which could only be run for d = 2^m, and every gate's emitted decomposition against its dense unitary across the whole gate set.

Related papers

Generalised Quantum Gates for Qudits and their Application in Quantum Fourier Transform

Francesco Pudda, Mario Chizzini, Crippa, Luca

Quantum computing with qudits, quantum systems with $d > 2$ levels, offers a powerful extension beyond qubits, expanding the computational possibilities of quantum systems, allowing the simplification of the implementation of several algorithms and, possibly, providing a foundation for optimised error correction. In this work, we propose a novel formulation of qudit gates that is universally applicable for any number of levels $d$, without restrictions on the dimensionality. By extending the mathematical framework of quantum gates to arbitrary dimensions, we derive explicit gate operations that form a universal set for quantum computation on qudits of any size. We demonstrate the validity of our approach through the implementation of the Quantum Fourier Transform (QFT) for arbitrary $d$, verifying both the correctness and utility of our generalized gates. This novel methodology broadens the design space for quantum algorithms and fault-tolerant architectures, paving the way for advancements in qudit-based quantum computing.

arXiv:2410.05122•Oct 7, 2024•0 citations

Efficient circuits for exact-universal computation with qudits

Gavin K. Brennen, Stephen S. Bullock, Dianne Prost O’Leary

This paper concerns the efficient implementation of quantum circuits for qudits. We show that controlled two-qudit gates can be implemented without ancillas and prove that the gate library containing arbitrary local unitaries and one two-qudit gate, $\CINC$, is exact-universal. A recent paper [S.Bullock, D.O'Leary, and G.K. Brennen, Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 230502 (2005)] describes quantum circuits for qudits which require O(d^n) two-qudit gates for state synthesis and O(d^{2n}) two-qudit gates for unitary synthesis, matching the respective lower bound complexities. In this work, we present the state-synthesis circuit in much greater detail and prove that it is correct. Also, the (n-2)/(d-2) ancillas required in the original algorithm may be removed without changing the asymptotics. Further, we present a new algorithm for unitary synthesis, inspired by the QR matrix decomposition, which is also asymptotically optimal.

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Qudit vs. qubit: Simulated performance of error-correction codes in higher dimensions

James Keppens, Quinten Eggerickx, Vukan Levajac +2 more

Qudits can be described by a state vector in a $q$-dimensional Hilbert space, enabling a more extensive encoding and manipulation of information compared to qubits. This implies that conducting fault-tolerant quantum computations using qudits rather than qubits might entail less overhead. In this work, we investigate the viability of qudits in error correction codes by creating and simulating the quantum circuitry for the smallest qudit error correction code with a multidimensional circuit-level noise model and specifically adapted decoders. After introducing a flag qudit to protect the code from hook errors, comparable error thresholds of the order of $10^{-4}$ are obtained for qudits of dimensions $2$, $3$ and $5$.

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Quantum-Fourier-transform-based quantum arithmetic with qudits

Archimedes Pavlidis, Emmanuel G. Floratos

We present some basic integer arithmetic quantum circuits, such as adders and multiplier-accumulators of various forms, which operate on multilevel qudits. The integers to be processed are represented in an alternative basis after they have been Fourier transformed. Several arithmetic circuits operating on Fourier-transformed integers have appeared in the literature for two-level qubits. Here we extend these techniques to multilevel qudits, as they may offer some advantages relative to qubit implementations. The arithmetic circuits presented here can be used as basic building blocks for higher level algorithms such as quantum phase estimation, quantum simulation, quantum optimization, etc. Detailed decomposition is given down to elementary two-level single- and two-qudit gates as such gates are the most appropriate for physical implementation. A complexity analysis is given after this decomposition step and it is shown that the depth of the circuits is linear in the number of qudits employed and quadratic in the dimension of each qudit while their quantum cost is quadratic in the number of the qudits and quadratic in the dimension.

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Efficient Circuits for Exact-Universal Computations with Qudits

Gavin K. Brennen, Stephen S. Bullock, Dianne Prost O’Leary

This paper concerns the efficient implementation of quantum circuits for qudits. We show that controlled two-qudit gates can be implemented without ancillas and prove that the gate library containing arbitrary local unitaries and one two-qudit gate, CINC, is exact-universal. A recent paper (PRL 94 230502) describes quantum circuits for qudits which require O(d^n) two-qudit gates for state synthesis and O(d^{2n}) two-qudit gates for unitary synthesis, matching the respective lower bound complexities. In this work, we present the state synthesis circuit in much greater detail and prove that it is correct. Also, the (n-2)/(d-2) ancillas required in the original algorithm may be removed without changing the asymptotics. Further, we present a new algorithm for unitary synthesis, inspired by the QR matrix decomposition, which is also asymptotically optimal.

arXiv:quant-ph/0509161•Sep 22, 2005•5 citations

Parallelism for quantum computation with qudits

Dianne Prost O’Leary, Gavin K. Brennen, Stephen S. Bullock

Robust quantum computation with $d$-level quantum systems (qudits) poses two requirements: fast, parallel quantum gates and high-fidelity two-qudit gates. We first describe how to implement parallel single-qudit operations. It is by now well known that any single-qudit unitary can be decomposed into a sequence of Givens rotations on two-dimensional subspaces of the qudit state space. Using a coupling graph to represent physically allowed couplings between pairs of qudit states, we then show that the logical depth (time) of the parallel gate sequence is equal to the height of an associated tree. The implementation of a given unitary can then optimize the tradeoff between gate time and resources used. These ideas are illustrated for qudits encoded in the ground hyperfine states of the alkali-metal atoms $^{87}\mathrm{Rb}$ and $^{133}\mathrm{Cs}$. Second, we provide a protocol for implementing parallelized nonlocal two-qudit gates using the assistance of entangled qubit pairs. Using known protocols for qubit entanglement purification, this offers the possibility of high-fidelity two-qudit gates.

arXiv:quant-ph/0603081•Physical Review A•Sep 28, 2006•60 citations

qiskit-qudits is a Qiskit extension that simulates d-level qudits by encoding each one into m = ceil(log_2 d) qubits. Qudit gates are exposed as ordinary Qiskit Gate and ControlledGate subclasses, and operations that are not unitary gates (measurement, reset, barrier, state preparation) as dedicated Instruction subclasses dispatched through a dedicated apply() hook; every gate carries both a dense encoded unitary (via NumPy's array protocol) and a qubit-level definition. Because d need not be a power of two, the encoded Hilbert space is generally larger than the logical one; the library resolves this by the identity-padding convention, in which every gate acts as the identity on the unphysical part of the encoded space. When every operand dimension is a power of two, gates decompose into a fixed, transpiler-recognisable cascade of standard qubit gates; otherwise the library falls back to exact dense unitary synthesis, so that dimensions 2 <= d <= 16 are supported exactly, not only powers of two. This paper describes the software's circuit model, gate hierarchy, decomposition strategy, and measurement/decoding machinery, states its limitations, and verifies the implementation numerically: the qudit QFT against the discrete Fourier transform for both power-of-two and non-power-of-two d, extending the check of the underlying theory paper, which could only be run for d = 2^m, and every gate's emitted decomposition against its dense unitary across the whole gate set.

Quantum computing with qudits, quantum systems with

d > 2

levels, offers a powerful extension beyond qubits, expanding the computational possibilities of quantum systems, allowing the simplification of the implementation of several algorithms and, possibly, providing a foundation for optimised error correction. In this work, we propose a novel formulation of qudit gates that is universally applicable for any number of levels

d

, without restrictions on the dimensionality. By extending the mathematical framework of quantum gates to arbitrary dimensions, we derive explicit gate operations that form a universal set for quantum computation on qudits of any size. We demonstrate the validity of our approach through the implementation of the Quantum Fourier Transform (QFT) for arbitrary

d

, verifying both the correctness and utility of our generalized gates. This novel methodology broadens the design space for quantum algorithms and fault-tolerant architectures, paving the way for advancements in qudit-based quantum computing.

This paper concerns the efficient implementation of quantum circuits for qudits. We show that controlled two-qudit gates can be implemented without ancillas and prove that the gate library containing arbitrary local unitaries and one two-qudit gate, $\CINC$, is exact-universal. A recent paper [S.Bullock, D.O'Leary, and G.K. Brennen, Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 230502 (2005)] describes quantum circuits for qudits which require O(d^n) two-qudit gates for state synthesis and O(d^{2n}) two-qudit gates for unitary synthesis, matching the respective lower bound complexities. In this work, we present the state-synthesis circuit in much greater detail and prove that it is correct. Also, the (n-2)/(d-2) ancillas required in the original algorithm may be removed without changing the asymptotics. Further, we present a new algorithm for unitary synthesis, inspired by the QR matrix decomposition, which is also asymptotically optimal.

Qudits can be described by a state vector in a

q

-dimensional Hilbert space, enabling a more extensive encoding and manipulation of information compared to qubits. This implies that conducting fault-tolerant quantum computations using qudits rather than qubits might entail less overhead. In this work, we investigate the viability of qudits in error correction codes by creating and simulating the quantum circuitry for the smallest qudit error correction code with a multidimensional circuit-level noise model and specifically adapted decoders. After introducing a flag qudit to protect the code from hook errors, comparable error thresholds of the order of

10^{-4}

are obtained for qudits of dimensions

2

,

3

and

5

.

We present some basic integer arithmetic quantum circuits, such as adders and multiplier-accumulators of various forms, which operate on multilevel qudits. The integers to be processed are represented in an alternative basis after they have been Fourier transformed. Several arithmetic circuits operating on Fourier-transformed integers have appeared in the literature for two-level qubits. Here we extend these techniques to multilevel qudits, as they may offer some advantages relative to qubit implementations. The arithmetic circuits presented here can be used as basic building blocks for higher level algorithms such as quantum phase estimation, quantum simulation, quantum optimization, etc. Detailed decomposition is given down to elementary two-level single- and two-qudit gates as such gates are the most appropriate for physical implementation. A complexity analysis is given after this decomposition step and it is shown that the depth of the circuits is linear in the number of qudits employed and quadratic in the dimension of each qudit while their quantum cost is quadratic in the number of the qudits and quadratic in the dimension.

This paper concerns the efficient implementation of quantum circuits for qudits. We show that controlled two-qudit gates can be implemented without ancillas and prove that the gate library containing arbitrary local unitaries and one two-qudit gate, CINC, is exact-universal. A recent paper (PRL 94 230502) describes quantum circuits for qudits which require O(d^n) two-qudit gates for state synthesis and O(d^{2n}) two-qudit gates for unitary synthesis, matching the respective lower bound complexities. In this work, we present the state synthesis circuit in much greater detail and prove that it is correct. Also, the (n-2)/(d-2) ancillas required in the original algorithm may be removed without changing the asymptotics. Further, we present a new algorithm for unitary synthesis, inspired by the QR matrix decomposition, which is also asymptotically optimal.

Robust quantum computation with

d

-level quantum systems (qudits) poses two requirements: fast, parallel quantum gates and high-fidelity two-qudit gates. We first describe how to implement parallel single-qudit operations. It is by now well known that any single-qudit unitary can be decomposed into a sequence of Givens rotations on two-dimensional subspaces of the qudit state space. Using a coupling graph to represent physically allowed couplings between pairs of qudit states, we then show that the logical depth (time) of the parallel gate sequence is equal to the height of an associated tree. The implementation of a given unitary can then optimize the tradeoff between gate time and resources used. These ideas are illustrated for qudits encoded in the ground hyperfine states of the alkali-metal atoms

^{87}\mathrm{Rb}

and

^{133}\mathrm{Cs}

. Second, we provide a protocol for implementing parallelized nonlocal two-qudit gates using the assistance of entangled qubit pairs. Using known protocols for qubit entanglement purification, this offers the possibility of high-fidelity two-qudit gates.