Quanlong Wang

Bob Coecke, Dominic Horsman, Aleks Kissinger et al.

This paper is a `spiritual child' of the 2005 lecture notes Kindergarten Quantum Mechanics, which showed how a simple, pictorial extension of Dirac notation allowed several quantum features to be easily expressed and derived, using language even a kindergartner can understand. Central to that approach was the use of pictures and pictorial transformation rules to understand and derive features of quantum theory and computation. However, this approach left many wondering `where's the beef?' In other words, was this new approach capable of producing new results, or was it simply an aesthetically pleasing way to restate stuff we already know? The aim of this sequel paper is to say `here's the beef!', and highlight some of the major results of the approach advocated in Kindergarten Quantum Mechanics, and how they are being applied to tackle practical problems on real quantum computers. We will focus mainly on what has become the Swiss army knife of the pictorial formalism: the ZX-calculus. First we look at some of the ideas behind the ZX-calculus, comparing and contrasting it with the usual quantum circuit formalism. We then survey results from the past 2 years falling into three categories: (1) completeness of the rules of the ZX-calculus, (2) state-of-the-art quantum circuit optimisation results in commercial and open-source quantum compilers relying on ZX, and (3) the use of ZX in translating real-world stuff like natural language into quantum circuits that can be run on today's (very limited) quantum hardware. We also take the title literally, and outline an ongoing experiment aiming to show that ZX-calculus enables children to do cutting-edge quantum computing stuff. If anything, this would truly confirm that `kindergarten quantum mechanics' wasn't just a joke.

Quanlong Wang, Richie Yeung, Mark Koch

ZX-calculus has proved to be a useful tool for quantum technology with a wide range of successful applications. Most of these applications are of an algebraic nature. However, other tasks that involve differentiation and integration remain unreachable with current ZX techniques. Here we elevate ZX to an analytical perspective by realising differentiation and integration entirely within the framework of ZX-calculus. We explicitly illustrate the new analytic framework of ZX-calculus by applying it in context of quantum machine learning for the analysis of barren plateaus.

Quanlong Wang, Richie Yeung

In linear algebra applications, elementary matrices hold a significant role. This paper presents a diagrammatic representation of all $2^m\times 2^n$-sized elementary matrices in algebraic ZX-calculus, showcasing their properties on inverses and transpose through diagrammatic rewriting. Additionally, the paper uses this representation to depict the Jozsa-style matchgate in algebraic ZX-calculus. To further enhance practical use, we have implemented this representation in \texttt{discopy}. Overall, this work sets the groundwork for more applications of ZX-calculus such as synthesising controlled matrices [arXiv:2212.04462] in quantum computing.

Camilo Miguel Signorelli, Quanlong Wang, Bob Coecke

We cast aspects of consciousness in axiomatic mathematical terms, using the graphical calculus of general process theories (a.k.a symmetric monoidal categories and Frobenius algebras therein). This calculus exploits the ontological neutrality of process theories. A toy example using the axiomatic calculus is given to show the power of this approach, recovering other aspects of conscious experience, such as external and internal subjective distinction, privacy or unreadability of personal subjective experience, and phenomenal unity, one of the main issues for scientific studies of consciousness. In fact, these features naturally arise from the compositional nature of axiomatic calculus.

Camilo Miguel Signorelli, Quanlong Wang, Ilyas Khan

Scientific studies of consciousness rely on objects whose existence is assumed to be independent of any consciousness. On the contrary, we assume consciousness to be fundamental, and that one of the main features of consciousness is characterized as being other-dependent. We set up a framework which naturally subsumes this feature by defining a compact closed category where morphisms represent conscious processes. These morphisms are a composition of a set of generators, each being specified by their relations with other generators, and therefore co-dependent. The framework is general enough and fits well into a compositional model of consciousness. Interestingly, we also show how our proposal may become a step towards avoiding the hard problem of consciousness, and thereby address the combination problem of conscious experiences.

Xin Sun, Quanlong Wang, Piotr Kulicki

This paper proposes a simple voting protocol based on quantum blockchain. Besides being simple, our voting protocol is anonymous, binding, non-reusable, verifiable, eligible, fair and self-tallying. Our protocol is also realizable by the current technology.

Xin Sun, Quanlong Wang, Piotr Kulicki et al.

We proposed a framework of quantum-enhanced logic-based blockchain, which improves the efficiency and power of quantum-secured blockchain. The efficiency is improved by using a new quantum honest-success Byzantine agreement protocol to replace the classical Byzantine agreement protocol, while the power is improved by incorporating quantum protection and quantum certificate into the syntax of transactions. Our quantum-secured logic-based blockchain can already be implemented by the current technology. The cryptocurrency created and transferred in our blockchain is called qulogicoin. Incorporating quantum protection and quantum certificates into blockchain makes it possible to use blockchain to overcome the limitations of some quantum cryptographic protocols. As an illustration, we show that a significant shortcoming of cheat-sensitive quantum bit commitment protocols can be overcome with the help of our blockchain and qulogicoin.