Dissertation

Methods to simulate fermions on quantum computers with hardware limitations

This thesis is a collection of theoretical works aiming at adjusting quantum algorithms to the hardware of quantum computers.

Author: Steudtner, M.
Date: 20 November 2019
Links: Thesis in Leiden Repository

This thesis is a collection of theoretical works aiming at adjusting quantum algorithms to the hardware of quantum computers. The overarching topic of these efforts is to enable digital quantum simulation, the process of approximating the ground state of an arbitrary physical system with elementary operations of a quantum computer. For fermionic systems, a class including molecules and materials, the impact of quantum computing would be undoubtedly high, and algorithms exist for their simulation. However, there is a certain gap between the requirements of those algorithms and what actual quantum devices can provide: it seems that our expectations of a fully-fledged quantum computer still exceed our capabilities to build it. To make quantum simulation feasible, we seek to adapt quantum algorithms to three different types of device limitations within this thesis.