Quantum Information

We study approximate quantum low-density parity-check (QLDPC) codes, which are approximate quantum error-correcting codes specified as the ground space of a frustration-free local Hamiltonian, whose terms do not necessarily commute. Such codes generalize stabilizer QLDPC codes, which are exact quantum error-correcting codes with sparse, low-weight stabilizer generators (i.e. each stabilizer generator acts on a few qubits, and each qubit participates in a few stabilizer generators). Our investigation is motivated by an important question in Hamiltonian complexity and quantum coding theory: do stabilizer QLDPC codes with constant rate, linear distance, and constant-weight stabilizers exist? We show that obtaining such optimal scaling of parameters (modulo polylogarithmic corrections) is possible if we go beyond stabilizer codes: we prove the existence of a family of [[N,k,d,ε]] approximate QLDPC codes that encode k = Ω(N/polylog N) into N physical qubits with distance d = Ω(N/polylog N) and approximation infidelity ε = 1/polylog N. We prove the existence of an efficient encoding map, and we show that arbitrary Pauli errors can be locally detected by circuits of polylogarithmic depth. Finally, we show that the spectral gap of the code Hamiltonian is Ω(N^(-3.09)) (up to polylog(N) factors) by analyzing a spacetime circuit-to-Hamiltonian construction for a bitonic sorting network architecture that is spatially local in polylog(N) spatial dimensions. (Joint work with Elizabeth Crosson, Chinmay Nirkhe, and Henry Yuen, arXiv:1811.00277)

One of the central problems in the study of quantum resource theories is to provide a given resource with an operational meaning, characterizing physical tasks relevant to information processing in which the resource can give an explicit advantage over all resourceless states. We show that this can always be accomplished for all convex resource theories. We establish in particular that any resource state enables an advantage in a channel discrimination task, allowing for a strictly greater success probability than any state without the given resource. Furthermore, we find that the generalized robustness measure serves as an exact quantifier for the maximal advantage enabled by the given resource state in a class of subchannel discrimination problems, providing a universal operational interpretation to this fundamental resource quantifier. 

Next, we significantly extend the above consideration beyond "quantum" resource theories of "states"; we establish an operational characterization of general convex resource theories --- describing the resource content of not only states, but also measurements and channels, both within quantum mechanics and in general probabilistic theories (GPTs) --- in the context of state and channel discrimination. We find that discrimination tasks provide a unified operational description for quantification and manipulation of resources by showing that the family of robustness measures can be understood as the maximum advantage provided by any physical resource in several different discrimination tasks, as well as establishing that such discrimination problems can fully characterize the allowed transformations within the given resource theory. Our results establish a fundamental connection between the operational tasks of discrimination and core concepts of resource theories --- the geometric quantification of resources and resource manipulation --- valid for all physical theories beyond quantum mechanics with no additional assumptions about the structure of the GPT required.

References: 

[1] Ryuji Takagi, Bartosz Regula, Kaifeng Bu, Zi-Wen Liu, and Gerardo Adesso, "Operational Advantage of Quantum Resources in Subchannel Discrimination", Phys. Rev. Lett. 122.140402 (2019)

[2] Ryuji Takagi and Bartosz Regula, "General resource theories in quantum mechanics and beyond: operational characterization via discrimination tasks", arXiv: 1901.08127

How violently do two quantum operators disagree? Different subfields of physics feature different notions of incompatibility: i) In quantum information theory, uncertainty relations are cast in terms of entropies. These entropic uncertainty relations constrain measurement outcomes. ii) Condensed matter and high-energy physics feature interacting quantum many-body systems, such as spin chains. A local perturbation, such as a Pauli operator on one side of a chain, preads through many-body entanglement. The perturbation comes to overlap, and to disagree, with probes localized on the opposite side of the system. This disagreement signals that quantum information about the perturbation has scrambled, or become hidden in highly nonlocal correlations. I will unite these two notions of quantum operator disagreement, presenting an entropic uncertainty relation for quantum-information scrambling. The entropies are of distributions over weak and strong measurements' possible outcomes. The uncertainty bound strengthens when a spin chain scrambles in numerical simulations. Hence the subfields - quantum information, condensed matter, and high-energy physics - can agree about when quantum operations disagree. Our relation can be tested experimentally with superconducting qubits, trapped ions, and quantum dots. 

NYH, Bartolotta, and Pollack, accepted by Comms. Phys. (in press) arXiv:1806.04147.