Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity

While quantum state tomography is notoriously hard, most states hold little interest to practically minded tomographers. Given that states and unitaries appearing in nature are of bounded gate complexity, it is natural to ask if efficient learning becomes possible. In this work, we prove that to lea...

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Main Authors: Haimeng Zhao, Laura Lewis, Ishaan Kannan, Yihui Quek, Hsin-Yuan Huang, Matthias C. Caro
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: American Physical Society 2024-10-01
Series:PRX Quantum
Online Access:http://doi.org/10.1103/PRXQuantum.5.040306
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author Haimeng Zhao
Laura Lewis
Ishaan Kannan
Yihui Quek
Hsin-Yuan Huang
Matthias C. Caro
author_facet Haimeng Zhao
Laura Lewis
Ishaan Kannan
Yihui Quek
Hsin-Yuan Huang
Matthias C. Caro
author_sort Haimeng Zhao
collection DOAJ
description While quantum state tomography is notoriously hard, most states hold little interest to practically minded tomographers. Given that states and unitaries appearing in nature are of bounded gate complexity, it is natural to ask if efficient learning becomes possible. In this work, we prove that to learn a state generated by a quantum circuit with G two-qubit gates to a small trace distance, a sample complexity scaling linearly in G is necessary and sufficient. We also prove that the optimal query complexity to learn a unitary generated by G gates to a small average-case error scales linearly in G. While sample-efficient learning can be achieved, we show that under reasonable cryptographic conjectures, the computational complexity for learning states and unitaries of gate complexity G must scale exponentially in G. We illustrate how these results establish fundamental limitations on the expressivity of quantum machine-learning models and provide new perspectives on no-free-lunch theorems in unitary learning. Together, our results answer how the complexity of learning quantum states and unitaries relate to the complexity of creating these states and unitaries.
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spelling doaj-art-730c469988fd4b67b5bce8209329f52e2025-08-20T02:57:51ZengAmerican Physical SocietyPRX Quantum2691-33992024-10-015404030610.1103/PRXQuantum.5.040306Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate ComplexityHaimeng ZhaoLaura LewisIshaan KannanYihui QuekHsin-Yuan HuangMatthias C. CaroWhile quantum state tomography is notoriously hard, most states hold little interest to practically minded tomographers. Given that states and unitaries appearing in nature are of bounded gate complexity, it is natural to ask if efficient learning becomes possible. In this work, we prove that to learn a state generated by a quantum circuit with G two-qubit gates to a small trace distance, a sample complexity scaling linearly in G is necessary and sufficient. We also prove that the optimal query complexity to learn a unitary generated by G gates to a small average-case error scales linearly in G. While sample-efficient learning can be achieved, we show that under reasonable cryptographic conjectures, the computational complexity for learning states and unitaries of gate complexity G must scale exponentially in G. We illustrate how these results establish fundamental limitations on the expressivity of quantum machine-learning models and provide new perspectives on no-free-lunch theorems in unitary learning. Together, our results answer how the complexity of learning quantum states and unitaries relate to the complexity of creating these states and unitaries.http://doi.org/10.1103/PRXQuantum.5.040306
spellingShingle Haimeng Zhao
Laura Lewis
Ishaan Kannan
Yihui Quek
Hsin-Yuan Huang
Matthias C. Caro
Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity
PRX Quantum
title Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity
title_full Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity
title_fullStr Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity
title_full_unstemmed Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity
title_short Learning Quantum States and Unitaries of Bounded Gate Complexity
title_sort learning quantum states and unitaries of bounded gate complexity
url http://doi.org/10.1103/PRXQuantum.5.040306
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AT ishaankannan learningquantumstatesandunitariesofboundedgatecomplexity
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AT hsinyuanhuang learningquantumstatesandunitariesofboundedgatecomplexity
AT matthiasccaro learningquantumstatesandunitariesofboundedgatecomplexity