Southwest Quantum Information and Technology

Quantum algorithms for physicists

Presenting Author: Anya Houk, California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
Contributing Author(s): Katharina Gillen

Quantum computing is a cross-disciplinary field, but members of different disciplines often hold different paradigms. There are not a lot of resources designed for translating concepts from one discipline to another. For example, with the direction the world of quantum computing is going physicists need to gain a better understanding of quantum algorithms in order to implement them on their devices. This can be especially important for undergraduate students as emerging careers in quantum computing open. In this project we, an undergraduate computer engineering student and a physics professor, started with a high-level description of Grover’s quantum search algorithm and learned how to break it into its major operations and step by step decomposed each into its single and two qubits gate level circuits. At this level of gate decomposition, physicist know how to physically implement these operations on existing systems like neutral atoms trapped by light and addressed by laser beams. We hope that our experience will be educational for others.

(Session 5 : Saturday from 5:00pm - 7:00pm)