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Using Small Dimensional Quantum Error Correction Codes for High-Performance Quantum Communication

Dawei Jiao, Alexei Ashikhmin, Mahdi Bayanifar, Olav Tirkkonen

Published Dec 4, 2023• 2 citations
Publisher

Abstract

For achieving long-distance quantum communication, Quantum Repeaters (QRs) have to be used, with commu-nication range and reliability increased by using intermediate stations. The physical requirements of second generation QRs may be achievable in the near future. They use Quantum Error Correction Codes (QECC) to protect logical qubits against environmental interaction using physical redundancy. In this work, we study the types of errors that can corrupt quantum codewords in intermediate stations. Our studies show that the errors are distance-dependent, and also consist of correlated errors and biased errors. To mitigate this error model, we use non-symmetric CSS codes as well as mirrored structure coding. We show that using non-symmetric CSS codes results in better performance. Also, we prove the logical CZ gate transversality of the mirrored structure coding. The effectiveness of the proposed methods is verified by numerical simulations.

DOI
10.1109/globecom54140.2023.10436732

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For achieving long-distance quantum communication, Quantum Repeaters (QRs) have to be used, with commu-nication range and reliability increased by using intermediate stations. The physical requirements of second generation QRs may be achievable in the near future. They use Quantum Error Correction Codes (QECC) to protect logical qubits against environmental interaction using physical redundancy. In this work, we study the types of errors that can corrupt quantum codewords in intermediate stations. Our studies show that the errors are distance-dependent, and also consist of correlated errors and biased errors. To mitigate this error model, we use non-symmetric CSS codes as well as mirrored structure coding. We show that using non-symmetric CSS codes results in better performance. Also, we prove the logical CZ gate transversality of the mirrored structure coding. The effectiveness of the proposed methods is verified by numerical simulations.
We consider 2nd generation (2G) Quantum Repeaters (QR) for creating long-distance entanglement in quantum networks. Combining a distance-dependent depolarizing error model with the non-local Bell-state purification procedure required by 2G QRs leads to an error model consisting of correlated and biased errors. To correct correlated errors, non-symmetric CSS codes with joint decoding between stations can be used. The dominating errors are biased, such that different repeater stations suffer from different types of errors. To mitigate this, different quantum codes can be used at the stations, optimized for the specific error model of the station. To comply with the 2G QR procedure, the codes used in neighboring stations must allow for the transversal implementation of non-local logical CNOT gates across the two stations, or alternatively, non-local CZ gates combined with logical Hadamards. We provide a complete characterization of pairs of Calderbank-Steane-Shor (CSS) codes that allow CNOT- or CZ-transversality, and examine an explicit family of mirrored CSS codes allowing CZ-transversality. We verify the Hadamard gate transversality using our framework and show the importance of the mapping matrix. Also, we conclude that using different QECCs can not achieve transversal universal computation with Clifford +TTT-gate set. Finally, we study the entanglement generation rate (EGR) in 2G QRs with limited quantum memory, minimizing the number of intermediate stations for a given fidelity and EGR. By simulation we observe that non-symmetric and mirrored structure QECCs outperform the conventional approach of using symmetric CSS codes at the repeater stations.
In this work, we generalize the concept of transversality in quantum error-correcting codes. Unlike conventional methods, we study transversal logical two-qubit gates between two different codes. We consider an application of this concept for quantum networks which consist of multiple intermediate stations equipped with quantum repeaters (QRs). The stations may experience different error models. For instance, in one station, a particular Pauli error may dominate, whereas in its neighboring stations, other types of Pauli errors are more likely. The standard approach of using the same CSS code Q{\mathcal{Q}}Q in different stations does not allow for simultaneously adaptating Q{\mathcal{Q}}Q to be optimized to the errors prevailing in various stations. Considering this fact, we suggest using different CSS codes in each station. In this work, we analyze CNOT and CZ transversality for pairs of CSS codes and provide a complete characterization. We formulate necessary and sufficient conditions for a pair of CSS codes to be CNOT and CZ transversal. In comparison to the conventional approach of having the same CSS code, we show that these conditions are less restrictive.
In this paper, we investigate the transversality of pairs of CSS codes and their use in the second generation of quantum repeaters (QR)s. We show that different stations of quantum link can experience different errors. Considering this fact, we suggest to use different CSS codes in different stations. We also suggest to use [[n,k]][[n, k]][[n,k]] codes with k>1k > 1k>1 as they are more efficient then codes with k=1k = 1k=1. We establish sufficient and necessary conditions for a pair of CSS codes to be non-local CNOT-transversal. We show that in contrast to the well known CNOT transversality which states that two CSS codes should be the same, less restrictive constraints are needed. Next, we establish sufficient and necessary conditions for a code pair to be CZ-transversal.
Quantum repeaters are essential for scalable long-distance quantum networking. As quantum information processing moves toward fault-tolerant and error-corrected operations, it becomes increasingly important to study quantum repeaters that also move beyond raw physical entanglement and towards logical entanglement. In this paper, we implement and simulate the quantum repeater with encoding and classical error correction (QRE-CEC) protocol in SeQUeNCe, a discrete-event simulator of quantum networks. The protocol distributes logical Bell pairs, performs encoded entanglement swapping, and uses classical error correction for the decoding of entanglement swapping measurement outcomes to determine Pauli-frame corrections. For this study, we extend SeQUeNCe with a stabilizer-based backend, add support for CSS code-based encoded operations, and integrate gate, measurement, idle decoherence, and state-initialization noise models. Our simulation results show that QRE-CEC suppresses all modeled errors to the second order. Also, QRE-CEC can distribute logical Bell pairs with 0.91 fidelity over a distance of 2000 km under the parameter regimes we study. Beyond protocol-level performance evaluation, our implementation exposes practical simulator and control-plane challenges that are typically abstracted away in theoretical studies.
The employment of quantum error correction codes (QECCs) within quantum computers potentially offers a reliability improvement for both quantum computation and communications tasks. However, the laws of quantum mechanics prevent us from directly invoking the mature family of classical error correction codes in the quantum domain. In order to circumvent the associated problems, the notion of quantum stabilizer codes (QSCs) was proposed in conjunction with syndrome-based decoding in the quantum regime. However, most of the powerful QSC schemes require long codewords for achieving a high performance, which potentially imposes additional challenges for implementation concerning their implementation, since their decoding may require longer than the quantum circuit's coherence time. Hence at the time of writing, QSCs exhibiting short to moderate codeword lengths are preferable. We commence by describing the pivotal problem encountered by classical error-correction codes, which also emerges when designing the QSCs, namely the intrinsic trade-off between the minimum distance versus coding rate. The complete formulation of this particular trade-off does not exist, but several lower and upper bounds can be found in the literature. It has been shown that a substantial gap can be observed between the upper and lower bound of the minimum distance, given the codeword length and the quantum coding rate. Hence, we propose an appealingly simple and invertible analytical approximation, for characterizing the trade-off between the quantum coding rate and the minimum distance of QSCs as well as their corresponding quantum bit error rate (QBER) performance upper-bound. For example, for a half-rate QSC having a codeword length of n = 128, the minimum distance is bounded by 11 < d < 22, while our approximation yields a minimum distance of d = 17 for the above-mentioned code. Next, we link this parametric study of the minimum distance versus quantum coding rate to the popular QSCs, namely to the family of quantum topological error correction codes (QTECCs). In order to construct the classical-to-quantum isomorphism, we conceive and investigate the family of classical topological error correction codes (TECCs), assuming that the bits of a codeword can be arranged in a lattice structure. We then present the classical-to-quantum isomorphism to pave the way for constructing their dual pairs in the quantum domain, which are the QTECCs. Finally, we characterize the performance of QTECCs in the face of the quantum depolarizing channel in terms of both their QBER and fidelity. Specifically, we demonstrate that for quantum coding rate rQ ~ 0, the threshold probability of the QBER below which the colour, rotated-surface, surface, and toric codes become capable of improving the uncoded QBER are given by 1.8 ×10-2, 1.3 ×10-2, 6.3 ×10-2 and 6.8 ×10-2, respectively. Furthermore, we also demonstrate that we can achieve beneficial fidelity improvements above the minimum fidelity of 0.94, 0.97 and 0.99 by employing the rQ = 1/7 colour code, the rQ = 1/9 rotated-surface code, and the rQ = 1/13 surface code, respectively. However, QSCs require additional quantum gates for their employment. Incorporating more quantum gates for performing error correction potentially introduces further sources of quantum decoherence into quantum computers. In this scenario, the primary challenge is to find the sufficient condition required by each of the quantum gates for beneficially employing QECCs in order to yield reliability improvements, given that the quantum gates utilized by the QECCs also introduce quantum decoherence. In this treatise, we approach this problem by firstly presenting the general framework of protecting quantum gates by the amalgamation of the transversal configuration of quantum gates and QSCs, which can be viewed as syndrome-based QECCs. Secondly, we provide examples of the advocated framework by invoking QTECCs for protecting both transversal Hadamard gates and controlled (CNOT) gates. Both our simulation and analytical results explicitly show that by utilizing QTECCs, the fidelity of the quantum gates can be beneficially improved, provided that quantum gates satisfying a certain minimum depolarization fidelity threshold (Fth) are available. For instance, for protecting transversal Hadamard gates, the minimum fidelity values required for each of the gates in order to attain fidelity improvements are 99.74%, 99.73%, 99.87%, and 99.86%, when they are protected by colour, rotated-surface, surface, and toric codes, respectively. Unfortunately, these specific Fth values can only be obtained for a very large number of physical qubits (n → ∞), when the quantum coding rate of the QTECCs approaches zero (rQ → 0). Finally, in order to conceive QSCs exhibiting a high quantum coding rate, we modify the construction of QTECCs for conceiving a low-complexity concatenated quantum turbocode (QTC). The above-mentioned high quantum coding rate is obtained by combining the quantum-domain version of short-block codes (SBCs) also known as single parity-check (SPC) codes as the outer codes and quantum unity-rate codes (QURCs) as the inner codes. Despite its design simplicity, the proposed QTC yields a near-hashing-bound error correction performance. For instance, compared to the best half-rate QTC known in the literature, namely the quantum irregular convolutional codes (QIrCCs) combined with the QURC scheme, which operates at the distance of D = 0.037 from the quantum hashing bound, our novel QSBC-QURC scheme can operate at the lower distance of D = 0:029. It is also worth mentioning that this is the first instantiation of QTCs capable of adjusting the quantum encoders according to the quantum coding rate required for mitigating the Pauli errors imposed by the time-variant depolarizing probabilities of the quantum channel.
Quantum repeaters (QRs) provide a way of enabling long distance quantum communication by establishing entangled qubits between remote locations. In this Letter, we investigate a new approach to QRs in which quantum information can be faithfully transmitted via a noisy channel without the use of long distance teleportation, thus eliminating the need to establish remote entangled links. Our approach makes use of small encoding blocks to fault-tolerantly correct both operational and photon loss errors. We describe a way to optimize the resource requirement for these QRs with the aim of the generation of a secure key. Numerical calculations indicate that the number of quantum memory bits at each repeater station required for the generation of one secure key has favorable polylogarithmic scaling with the distance across which the communication is desired.