Solving computational tasks using quantum computing

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-11250334-B2
Application number	US-201715491810-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Apr 19, 2017
Priority date	Apr 19, 2017
Publication date	Feb 15, 2022
Grant date	Feb 15, 2022

Abstract

Methods, systems, and apparatus for solving optimization tasks. In one aspect, a system includes one or more classical processors and one or more quantum computing resources, wherein the one or more classical processors and one or more quantum computing resources are configured to perform operations comprising receiving input data comprising data specifying a computational task to be solved; processing the received input data using a first quantum computing resource to generate data representing a reduced computational task, wherein the reduced computational task has lower dimensionality that the computational task; and processing the data representing the reduced computational task to obtain a solution to the computational task.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer implemented method for solving a computational task using a system including multiple computing resources, wherein the computational task comprises an optimization task and the multiple computing resources comprise at least one quantum computing resource, the method comprising:
receiving input data comprising data specifying the computational task to be solved, wherein the computational task is associated with a task dimensionality and a complexity based on an amount of classical or quantum computational resources required to solve the task;
identifying one or more available classical or quantum computing resources;
determining, based on the associated task dimensionality and complexity, whether the computational task is intractable for the one or more available classical or quantum computing resources, comprising determining whether a number of bits or qubits included in the one or more available classical or quantum computing resources are insufficient to solve the computational task in an acceptable time;
in response to determining that the computational task is intractable for the one or more available classical or quantum computing resources, instructing a first quantum computing resource to perform i) dimensionality reduction algorithm and ii) a circuit minimization algorithm, logic optimization algorithm or Hadamard gate reduction algorithm on the input data, comprising providing the input data to the first quantum computing resource for processing;
processing the received input data using the first quantum computing resource to generate data representing a reduced computational task, wherein the processing comprises performing i) a dimensionality reduction algorithm and ii) a circuit minimization algorithm, logic optimization algorithm or Hadamard gate reduction algorithm on the input data using the first quantum computing resource, and wherein the reduced computational task has lower dimensionality and lower task complexity than the computational task; and
processing the data representing the reduced computational task using an available classical or quantum computing resource to obtain a solution to the reduced computational task, wherein i) the solution to the reduced computational task comprises an approximate solution to the computational task and ii) processing the data representing the reduced computational task to obtain a solution to the reduced computational task uses a smaller number of classical or quantum logic gates than the number of classical or quantum logic gates required to solve the computational task.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the dimensionality of the computational task is based on a number of variables specified by the computational task.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein processing the received input data using the first quantum computing resource to generate data representing a reduced computational task comprises performing principal component analysis.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first quantum computing resource comprises a quantum gate computer or a quantum annealer.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein the input data comprises (i) data specifying the optimization task to be solved, and (ii) data specifying task objectives for solving the optimization task, comprising one or more local task objectives and one or more global task objectives.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein processing the data representing the reduced computational task using an available classical or quantum computing resource to obtain a solution to the optimization task comprises:
processing the received input data to obtain one or more initial solutions to the optimization task based on the local task objectives; and
processing the generated one or more initial solutions to generate a global solution to the optimization task based on the global task objectives.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the reduced computational task requires less classical or quantum computational resources to solve compared to the computational task.

8. A system of multiple computing resources, comprising:
one or more classical processors;
one or more quantum computing resources;
wherein the one or more classical processors and one or more quantum computing resources are configured to perform operations comprising:
receiving input data comprising data specifying the computational task to be solved, wherein the computational task is associated with a task dimensionality and a complexity based on an amount of classical or quantum computational resources required to solve the task;
identifying one or more available classical or quantum computing resources;
determining, based on the associated task dimensionality and complexity, whether the computational task is intractable for the one or more available classical or quantum computing resources, comprising determining whether a number of bits or qubits included in the one or more available classical or quantum computing resources are insufficient to solve the computational task in an acceptable time;
in response to determining that the computational task is intractable for the one or more available classical or quantum computing resources, instructing a first quantum computing resource to perform i) dimensionality reduction algorithm and ii) a circuit minimization algorithm, logic optimization algorithm or Hadamard gate reduction algorithm on the input data, comprising providing the input data to the first quantum computing resource for processing;
processing the received input data using the first quantum computing resource to generate data representing a reduced computational task, wherein the processing comprises performing i) a dimensionality reduction algorithm and ii) a circuit minimization algorithm, logic optimization algorithm or Hadamard gate reduction algorithm on the input data using the first quantum computing resource, and wherein the reduced computational task has lower dimensionality and lower task complexity than the computational task; and
processing the data representing the reduced computational task using an available classical or quantum computing resource to obtain a solution to the reduced computational task, wherein i) the solution to the reduced computational task comprises an approximate solution to the computational task and ii) processing the data representing the reduced computational task to obtain a solution to the reduced computational task uses a smaller number of classical or quantum logic gates than the number of classical or quantum logic gates required to solve the computational task.

9. The system of claim 8 , wherein the dimensionality of the computational task is based on a number of variables specified by the computational task.

10. The system of claim 8 , wherein processing the received input data using the first quantum computing resource to generate data representing a reduced computational task comprises performing principal component analysis.

11. The system of claim 8 , wherein the first quantum computing resource comprises a quantum gate computer or a quantum annealer.

12. The system of claim 8 , wherein the input data comprises (i) data specifying the optimization task to be solved, and (ii) data specifying task objectives for solving the optimization task, comprising one or more local task objectives and one or more global task objectives.

13. The system of claim 12 , wherein processing the data representing the reduced computational task using an available classical or quantum computing resource to obtain a solution to the optimization task comprises:
processing the received input data to obtain one or more initial so

Assignees

• Accenture Global Solutions Ltd

Inventors

• Fano Andrew E
• Weichenberger Jurgen Albert

Classifications

• G06N7/04 Primary

  Physical realisation · CPC title

• G06N10/60

  Quantum algorithms, e.g. based on quantum optimisation, quantum Fourier or Hadamard transforms · CPC title

• G06N5/04 Primary

  Inference or reasoning models · CPC title

• G06N10/00

  Quantum computing, i.e. information processing based on quantum-mechanical phenomena · CPC title