Abstract Machine learning has recently emerged as a fruitful area for finding potential quantum computational advantage. Many of the quantum-enhanced machine learning algorithms critically hinge upon the ability to efficiently produce states proportional to high-dimensional data points stored in a quantum accessible memory. Even given query access to exponentially many entries stored in a database, the construction of which is considered a one-off overhead, it has been argued that the cost of preparing such amplitude-encoded states may offset any exponential quantum advantage. Here we prove using smoothed analysis that if the data analysis algorithm is robust against small entry-wise input perturbation, state preparation can always be achieved with constant queries. This criterion is typically satisfied in realistic machine learning applications, where input data is subjective to moderate noise. Our results are equally applicable to the recent seminal progress in quantum-inspired algorithms, where specially constructed databases suffice for polylogarithmic classical algorithm in low-rank cases. The consequence of our finding is that for the purpose of practical machine learning, polylogarithmic processing time is possible under a general and flexible input model with quantum algorithms or quantum-inspired classical algorithms in the low-rank cases.
Abstract Machine learning has recently emerged as a fruitful area for finding potential quantum computational advantage. Many of the quantum-enhanced machine learning algorithms critically hinge upon the ability to efficiently produce states proportional to high-dimensional data points stored in a quantum accessible memory. Even given query access to exponentially many entries stored in a database, the construction of which is considered a one-off overhead, it has been argued that the cost of preparing such amplitude-encoded states may offset any exponential quantum advantage. Here we prove using smoothed analysis that if the data analysis algorithm is robust against small entry-wise input perturbation, state preparation can always be achieved with constant queries. This criterion is typically satisfied in realistic machine learning applications, where input data is subjective to moderate noise. Our results are equally applicable to the recent seminal progress in quantum-inspired algorithms, where specially constructed databases suffice for polylogarithmic classical algorithm in low-rank cases. The consequence of our finding is that for the purpose of practical machine learning, polylogarithmic processing time is possible under a general and flexible input model with quantum algorithms or quantum-inspired classical algorithms in the low-rank cases.
Machine learning has recently emerged as a fruitful area for finding potential quantum computational advantage. Many of the quantum enhanced machine learning algorithms critically hinge upon the ability to efficiently produce states proportional to high-dimensional data points stored in a quantum accessible memory. Even given query access to exponentially many entries stored in a database, the construction of which is considered a one-off overhead, it has been argued that the cost of preparing such amplitude-encoded states may offset any exponential quantum advantage. Here we prove using smoothed analysis, that if the data-analysis algorithm is robust against small entry-wise input perturbation, state preparation can always be achieved with constant queries. This criterion is typically satisfied in realistic machine learning applications, where input data is subjective to moderate noise. Our results are equally applicable to the recent seminal progress in quantum-inspired algorithms, where specially constructed databases suffice for polylogarithmic classical algorithm in low-rank cases. The consequence of our finding is that for the purpose of practical machine learning, polylogarithmic processing time is possible under a general and flexible input model with quantum algorithms or quantum-inspired classical algorithms in the low-rank cases.
Motivated by recent progress in quantum technologies and in particular quantum software, research and industrial communities have been trying to discover new applications of quantum algorithms such as quantum optimization and machine learning. Regardless of which hardware platform these novel algorithms operate on, whether it is adiabatic or gate based, from theoretical point of view, they are performing drastically better than their classical counterparts. Two promising areas of quantum algorithms quantum machine learning and quantum optimization. These are based on performing matrix operations using quantum states and operation, in order to speed up data analysis where quantum computing can efficiently work with high dimensional vectors. Motivated by that, quantum inspired algorithms (e.g. for recommendation systems and principal component analysis) are developed to cope with high dimensionality using probabilistic techniques that are inspire from quantum computing. In this paper we review recent progress in the area of quantum inspired algorithms for low rank matrix approximation. We further explore the possibility of using parametrized complexity for such algorithms to refine practical complexity analysis. Finally, we conjecture that quantum inspired algorithms that use low rank approximation and also sample and query technique for input representations are Fixed Parameter Tractable (FPT).
Quantum algorithms are conventionally presented with their input state supplied for free. When the input is classical data, this convention conceals a cost that is frequently larger than the algorithm it precedes. We review what the three standard encodings, such as basis encoding, amplitude encoding, and Grover--Rudolph distribution loading, actually cost once transpiled to a hardware gate set, and argue that the resulting Θ(N) bound is a counting theorem rather than an engineering limitation that improved hardware will remove. Measured gate counts for a representative loading task are reported: an optimal library implementation requires 247 CNOT gates at n=8 qubits and doubles with each additional qubit, while the classical preprocessing that produces the rotation angles requires reading the entire input vector. We show how this cost eliminates the quadratic advantage of quantum amplitude estimation for Monte Carlo integration, and argue that the same accounting constrains quantum machine learning more broadly: the strong input models that make quantum algorithms fast on classical data also enable classical dequantization, and quantum kernel methods carry a Θ(M2) state-preparation cost for the Gram matrix that does not amortize. We explain that the efficiently preparable states, device-generated distributions, variationally learned loading, and amortized preparation are required to get advantage from quantum machine learning and close with a checklist for evaluating input-dependent advantage claims. Executable notebooks reproducing every construction and measurement discussed here are available.
Broadly applicable quantum advantage, particularly in classical data processing and machine learning, has been a fundamental open problem. In this work, we prove that a small quantum computer of polylogarithmic size can perform large-scale classification and dimension reduction on massive classical data by processing samples on the fly, whereas any classical machine achieving the same prediction performance requires exponentially larger size. Furthermore, classical machines that are exponentially larger yet below the required size need superpolynomially more samples and time. We provide evidence for these quantum advantages in real-world applications, including single-cell RNA sequencing and movie review sentiment analysis, demonstrating four to six orders of magnitude reduction in size with fewer than 60 logical qubits. These quantum advantages are enabled by quantum oracle sketching, an algorithm for accessing the classical world in quantum superposition using only random classical data samples. Combined with classical shadows, our algorithm circumvents the data loading and readout bottleneck to construct succinct classical models from massive classical data, a task provably impossible for any classical machine that is not exponentially larger than the quantum machine. These quantum advantages persist even when classical machines are granted unlimited time or if BPP = BQP, and rely only on the correctness of quantum mechanics. Together, our results establish machine learning on classical data as a broad and natural domain of quantum advantage and a fundamental test of quantum mechanics at the complexity frontier.
It has been shown that the apparent advantage of some quantum machine learning algorithms may be efficiently replicated using classical algorithms with suitable data access -- a process known as dequantization. Existing works on dequantization compare quantum algorithms which take copies of an n-qubit quantum state ∣x⟩=∑ixi∣i⟩ as input to classical algorithms which have sample and query (SQ) access to the vector x. In this note, we prove that classical algorithms with SQ access can accomplish some learning tasks exponentially faster than quantum algorithms with quantum state inputs. Because classical algorithms are a subset of quantum algorithms, this demonstrates that SQ access can sometimes be significantly more powerful than quantum state inputs. Our findings suggest that the absence of exponential quantum advantage in some learning tasks may be due to SQ access being too powerful relative to quantum state inputs. If we compare quantum algorithms with quantum state inputs to classical algorithms with access to measurement data on quantum states, the landscape of quantum advantage can be dramatically different. We remark that when the quantum states are constructed from exponential-size classical data, comparing SQ access and quantum state inputs is appropriate since both require exponential time to prepare.
Recently, there has been a surge of interest for quantum computation for its ability to exponentially speed up algorithms, including machine learning algorithms. However, Tang suggested that the exponential speed up can also be done on a classical computer. In this paper, we proposed an algorithm for slow feature analysis, a machine learning algorithm that extracts the slow-varying features, with a run time O(polylog(n)poly(d)). To achieve this, we assumed necessary preprocessing of the input data as well as the existence of a data structure supporting a particular sampling scheme. The analysis of algorithm borrowed results from matrix perturbation theory, which was crucial for the algorithm's correctness. This work demonstrates the possible application and extent for which quantum-inspired computation can be used.