<!--HTML-->Abstract: There is no shortage of quantum machine learning papers observing that a particular quantum model "beats its classical counterparts on real-world datasets". However, the subtlety of choices made in benchmark experiments, the small scale of the models and data, as well as narratives influenced by the commercialisation of quantum technologies carry the danger of a strong positivity bias. To judge the true potential of prominent ideas in quantum machine learning we are conducting one of the first large-scale meta-studies that systematically tests 12 popular supervised quantum models at scale using the PennyLane software framework. This talk gives a sneak peek of some surprising preliminary results, and reveals the technical and conceptual difficulty of robust benchmarking, a skill which deserves more attention in the quantum applications literature.
<!--HTML-->Abstract: There is no shortage of quantum machine learning papers observing that a particular quantum model "beats its classical counterparts on real-world datasets". However, the subtlety of choices made in benchmark experiments, the small scale of the models and data, as well as narratives influenced by the commercialisation of quantum technologies carry the danger of a strong positivity bias. To judge the true potential of prominent ideas in quantum machine learning we are conducting one of the first large-scale meta-studies that systematically tests 12 popular supervised quantum models at scale using the PennyLane software framework. This talk gives a sneak peek of some surprising preliminary results, and reveals the technical and conceptual difficulty of robust benchmarking, a skill which deserves more attention in the quantum applications literature.
Benchmarking models via classical simulations is one of the main ways to judge ideas in quantum machine learning before noise-free hardware is available. However, the huge impact of the experimental design on the results, the small scales within reach today, as well as narratives influenced by the commercialisation of quantum technologies make it difficult to gain robust insights. To facilitate better decision-making we develop an open-source package based on the PennyLane software framework and use it to conduct a large-scale study that systematically tests 12 popular quantum machine learning models on 6 binary classification tasks used to create 160 individual datasets. We find that overall, out-of-the-box classical machine learning models outperform the quantum classifiers. Moreover, removing entanglement from a quantum model often results in as good or better performance, suggesting that "quantumness" may not be the crucial ingredient for the small learning tasks considered here. Our benchmarks also unlock investigations beyond simplistic leaderboard comparisons, and we identify five important questions for quantum model design that follow from our results.
<!--HTML-->What can we quantum-learn in the age of noisy quantum computation? Both more and less than you think. Noise limits our ability to error-mitigate, a term that refers to near-term schemes where errors that arise in a quantum computation are dealt with in classical pre-processing. I present a unifying framework for error mitigation and an analysis that strongly limits the degree to which quantum noise can be effectively `undone' for larger system sizes, and shows that current error mitigation schemes are more or less as good as they can be. After presenting this negative result, I'll switch to discussing how noise can be a friendly foe: non-unital noise, unlike its unital counterparts, surprisingly results in absence of barren plateaus in quantum machine learning.
<!--HTML-->The quest to understand the fundamental constituents of the universe is at the heart of particle physics. However, the complexity of particle interactions, the volume of data produced by experiments, and the intricacy of theoretical models present significant challenges to advancements in this field. In recent years, artificial intelligence has emerged as a transformative tool for overcoming these challenges, offering new pathways to accelerate the pace of discovery and fostering a deeper understanding of the fundamental forces of nature. This talk aims to elucidate the pivotal role AI plays in particle physics, from optimizing detector design and operation to analyzing vast datasets and validating theoretical models.
In recent years, there has been massive progress in the development of quantum technologies. Research on real-world applications for quantum devices has become a central focus within quantum computing, a field that integrates theoretical physics, engineering, software development, and education. One area of active investigation by several research groups is leveraging the unique advantages of quantum computing to advance machine learning. Ongoing efforts include developing quantum versions of both supervised and unsupervised techniques, such as artificial neural networks, clustering algorithms, Gaussian models, vector quantization, and principal component analysis (PCA). In this talk, we will explore the implementation of QML techines on real-world datasets, considering the practical limitations of current quantum hardware, including the restricted number of qubits and their susceptibility to noise.
Quantum Machine Learning represents a paradigm shift at the intersection of Quantum Computing and Machine Learning, leveraging quantum phenomena such as superposition, entanglement, and quantum parallelism to address the limitations of classical approaches in processing high-dimensional and large-scale datasets. This survey provides a comprehensive analysis of Quantum Machine Learning, detailing foundational concepts, algorithmic advancements, and their applications across domains such as healthcare, finance, and quantum chemistry. Key techniques, including Quantum Support Vector Machine, Quantum Neural Network, Quantum Decision Trees, and hybrid quantum-classical models, are explored with a focus on their theoretical foundations, computational benefits, and comparative performance against classical counterparts. While the potential for exponential speedups and enhanced efficiency is evident, the field faces significant challenges, including hardware constraints, noise, and limited qubit coherence in the current era of Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum devices. Emerging solutions, such as error mitigation techniques, hybrid frameworks, and advancements in quantum hardware, are discussed as critical enablers for scalable and fault-tolerant Quantum Machine Learning systems. By synthesizing state-of-the-art developments and identifying research gaps, this survey aims to provide a foundational resource for advancing Quantum Machine Learning toward practical, real-world applications in tackling computationally intensive problems.