Noise-induced barren plateaus in variational quantum algorithms

Samson Wang (), Enrico Fontana, M. Cerezo (), Kunal Sharma, Akira Sone, Lukasz Cincio and Patrick J. Coles ()
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Samson Wang: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Enrico Fontana: Los Alamos National Laboratory
M. Cerezo: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Kunal Sharma: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Akira Sone: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Lukasz Cincio: Los Alamos National Laboratory
Patrick J. Coles: Los Alamos National Laboratory

Nature Communications, 2021, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Variational Quantum Algorithms (VQAs) may be a path to quantum advantage on Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) computers. A natural question is whether noise on NISQ devices places fundamental limitations on VQA performance. We rigorously prove a serious limitation for noisy VQAs, in that the noise causes the training landscape to have a barren plateau (i.e., vanishing gradient). Specifically, for the local Pauli noise considered, we prove that the gradient vanishes exponentially in the number of qubits n if the depth of the ansatz grows linearly with n. These noise-induced barren plateaus (NIBPs) are conceptually different from noise-free barren plateaus, which are linked to random parameter initialization. Our result is formulated for a generic ansatz that includes as special cases the Quantum Alternating Operator Ansatz and the Unitary Coupled Cluster Ansatz, among others. For the former, our numerical heuristics demonstrate the NIBP phenomenon for a realistic hardware noise model.

Date: 2021
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DOI: 10.1038/s41467-021-27045-6

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