Information theory and computation articles within Nature Physics

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  • Article |

    The kernel method in machine learning can be implemented on near-term quantum computers. A 27-qubit device has now been used to solve learning problems using kernels that have the potential to be practically useful.

    • Jennifer R. Glick
    • , Tanvi P. Gujarati
    •  & Kristan Temme

  • Article |

    Topological features such as modularity and small-worldness are common in real-world networks. The emergence of such features may be driven by a trade-off between information exchange and response diversity that resembles thermodynamic efficiency.

    • Arsham Ghavasieh
    •  & Manlio De Domenico

  • News & Views |

    Scalable quantum computers require quantum error-correcting codes that can robustly store information. Exploiting the structure of well-known classical codes may help create more efficient approaches to quantum error correction.

    • Anirudh Krishna

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Large quantum computers will require error correcting codes, but most proposals have prohibitive requirements for overheads in the number of qubits, processing time or both. A way to combine smaller codes now gives a much more efficient protocol.

    • Hayata Yamasaki
    •  & Masato Koashi

  • Article |

    Being able to perform qubit measurements within a quantum circuit and adapt to their outcome broadens the power of quantum computers. These mid-circuit measurements have now been used to implement a cryptographic proof of non-classical behaviour.

    • Daiwei Zhu
    • , Gregory D. Kahanamoku-Meyer
    •  & Christopher Monroe

  • Research Briefing |

    Most quantum processors rely on native interactions between pairs of qubits to generate quantum entangling gates. Now, by modulating the driving laser fields, gates that entangle a triplet or quartet of trapped-ion qubits have been realized, creating useful new components for quantum computing applications.

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A formal analysis of the physical limits of entanglement manipulation shows that it cannot be done reversibly, highlighting an important difference from thermodynamics.

    • Ludovico Lami
    •  & Bartosz Regula

  • Article |

    Most temporal analyses of multivariate time series rely on pairwise statistics. A study combining network theory and topological data analysis now shows how to characterize the dynamics of signals at all orders of interactions in real-world data.

    • Andrea Santoro
    • , Federico Battiston
    •  & Enrico Amico

  • Article |

    Entanglement entropy between two parts of a quantum state generally grows with volume, but for one-dimensional and some two-dimensional ground states, it scales with area. An area law has now been proven for a related metric in any dimension or geometry.

    • Anurag Anshu
    • , Aram W. Harrow
    •  & Mehdi Soleimanifar

  • Letter |

    Qudits are generalizations of qubits that have more than two states, which gives them a performance advantage in some quantum algorithms. The operations needed for a universal qudit processor have now been demonstrated using trapped ions.

    • Martin Ringbauer
    • , Michael Meth
    •  & Thomas Monz

  • News & Views |

    A theoretical analysis shows how a person’s location in space could be verified by the transmission of single photons. A vital application of quantum networks may be within reach.

    • Yusuf Alnawakhtha
    •  & Carl A. Miller

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The dynamics of quantum states underlies the emergence of thermodynamics and even recent theories of quantum gravity. Now it has been proven that the quantum complexity of states evolving under random operations grows linearly in time.

    • Jonas Haferkamp
    • , Philippe Faist
    •  & Nicole Yunger Halpern

  • Article |

    Evaluations of quantum computers across architectures need reliable benchmarks. A class of benchmarks that can directly reflect the structure of any algorithm shows that different quantum computers have considerable variations in performance.

    • Timothy Proctor
    • , Kenneth Rudinger
    •  & Robin Blume-Kohout

  • Article |

    Information theory sets an upper limit on the ability of bacteria to navigate up chemical gradients. Experiments reveal that cells do so at speeds within a factor of two of the limit, suggesting they are selected to efficiently use information.

    • H. H. Mattingly
    • , K. Kamino
    •  & T. Emonet

  • Perspective |

    Network representations of complex systems are limited to pairwise interactions, but real-world systems often involve higher-order interactions. This Perspective looks at the new physics emerging from attempts to characterize these interactions.

    • Federico Battiston
    • , Enrico Amico
    •  & Giovanni Petri

  • Article |

    Many quantum machine learning algorithms have been proposed, but it is typically unknown whether they would outperform classical methods on practical devices. A specially constructed algorithm shows that a formal quantum advantage is possible.

    • Yunchao Liu
    • , Srinivasan Arunachalam
    •  & Kristan Temme

  • Letter |

    In general, it isn’t known when a quantum computer will have an advantage over a classical device. Now it’s proven that computers with limited working memory are more powerful if they are quantum.

    • Dmitri Maslov
    • , Jin-Sung Kim
    •  & Sarah Sheldon

  • Article |

    Learning the Hamiltonian of a complex many-body system is hard, but now there is proof that it can be done in a way where the number of required measurements scales as a polynomial of the number of particles.

    • Anurag Anshu
    • , Srinivasan Arunachalam
    •  & Mehdi Soleimanifar

  • Article |

    The ability to perform multiple tasks simultaneously is a key characteristic of parallel architectures. Using methods from statistical physics, this study provides analytical results that quantify the limitations of processing capacity for different types of tasks in neural networks.

    • Giovanni Petri
    • , Sebastian Musslick
    •  & Jonathan D. Cohen

  • Measure for Measure |

    Simulations are as much a part of science as hypothesis and experiment. But can their outcomes be considered observations? Wendy S. Parker investigates.

    • Wendy S. Parker

  • Article |

    Uncorrected noise prevents quantum computers from running deep algorithms and outperforming classical machines. A method is now reported that allows noisy shallow quantum algorithms to be used to solve classically hard problems.

    • Sergey Bravyi
    • , David Gosset
    •  & Marco Tomamichel

  • Article |

    The arrangement of a sequence of stimuli affects how humans perceive information. Here, the authors show experimentally that humans perceive information in a way that depends on the network structure of stimuli.

    • Christopher W. Lynn
    • , Lia Papadopoulos
    •  & Danielle S. Bassett

  • Comment |

    Automated learning from data by means of deep neural networks is finding use in an ever-increasing number of applications, yet key theoretical questions about how it works remain unanswered. A physics-based approach may help to bridge this gap.

    • Lenka Zdeborová

  • News & Views |

    Artificial neural networks now allow the dynamics of supercooled liquids to be predicted from their structure alone in an unprecedented way, thus providing a powerful new tool to study the physics of the glass transition.

    • Giulio Biroli

  • Comment |

    Physics is formulated in terms of timeless, axiomatic mathematics. A formulation on the basis of intuitionist mathematics, built on time-evolving processes, would offer a perspective that is closer to our experience of physical reality.

    • Nicolas Gisin

  • Measure for Measure |

    Superconducting quantum interference devices can accurately measure temperatures even below 1 mK, but there’s more to them — as Thomas Schurig explains.

    • Thomas Schurig

  • Perspective |

    A type of stochastic neural network called a restricted Boltzmann machine has been widely used in artificial intelligence applications for decades. They are now finding new life in the simulation of complex wavefunctions in quantum many-body physics.

    • Roger G. Melko
    • , Giuseppe Carleo
    •  & J. Ignacio Cirac

  • Article |

    Inspired to methods developed for the study of complex systems, a framework for predicting gross domestic product growth outperforms the accuracy of the five-year forecast of the International Monetary Fund.

    • A. Tacchella
    • , D. Mazzilli
    •  & L. Pietronero

  • Article |

    Finding the relevant degrees of freedom of a system is a key step in any renormalization group procedure. But this can be difficult, particularly in strongly interacting systems. A machine-learning algorithm proves adept at identifying them for us.

    • Maciej Koch-Janusz
    •  & Zohar Ringel

  • Letter |

    Erasing a bit of information has a fundamental, minimal energy cost that is given by the Landauer limit. The erasure of quantum information from a quantum-spin memory register encoded in a molecular nanomagnet is shown to obey the same principle.

    • R. Gaudenzi
    • , E. Burzurí
    •  & F. Luis

  • Measure for Measure |

    The bit is a proper unit of measurement and should be recognized as such, argues Iulia Georgescu.

    • Iulia Georgescu

  • Review Article |

    Simulating magnetically confined fusion plasmas is crucial to understand and control them. Here, the state of the art and the multi-physics involved are discussed: electromagnetism and hydrodynamics combined over vast spatiotemporal ranges.

    • A. Fasoli
    • , S. Brunner
    •  & L. Villard

  • News & Views |

    Quantum many-body systems are often so complex as to be intractable. An algorithm that finds the ground state of any one-dimensional quantum system has now been devised, proving that the many-body problem is tractable for quantum spin chains.

    • Frank Verstraete

  • Article |

    A computer based on droplets moving in microfluidic channels requires synchronous manipulation of the droplets. Such synchronous logic is now shown for a system of ferrofluid droplets, with a rotating magnetic field providing the computer clock rate.

    • Georgios Katsikis
    • , James S. Cybulski
    •  & Manu Prakash

  • Commentary |

    Writing efficient scientific software that makes best use of the increasing complexity of computer architectures requires bringing together modelling, applied mathematics and computer engineering. Physics may help unite these approaches.

    • Thomas C. Schulthess

  • News & Views |

    Quantum cryptographic schemes ensure security by sacrificing data to detect tampering. Now, an approach shows that monitoring disturbance is not essential because the limit on leaked information can be known in advance.

    • Marcos Curty

  • News & Views |

    Brownian motion in a feedback-controlled optical trap provides a minimal experimental realization of a Szilárd engine, confirming fluctuation theorems and demonstrating the importance of spontaneous symmetry breaking in small thermodynamic systems.

    • Jörn Dunkel

  • News & Views |

    Controlled switching of interacting ferroelectric surface domains leads to a variety of regular and chaotic patterns, and could provide a physical platform for performing calculations.

    • Alain Pignolet

  • News & Views |

    Information theory was originally developed to study the fundamental limits of telecommunication. But thanks to recent extensions it can now also be applied to solid-state physics.

    • Renato Renner

  • Article |

    If correlations decay exponentially in a one-dimensional quantum many-body system, then entanglement satisfies an area law. The intuitive explanation for this turns out to be wrong, but the statement is nevertheless true, as demonstrated by a proof based on quantum information theory.

    • Fernando G. S. L. Brandão
    •  & Michał Horodecki

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