DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Style
In this action unitalicized bold is used for claim language, while italicized bold is used for emphasis.
Information Disclosure Statement
All information disclosure statements are incompliance with the provisions of 37 C.F.R. § 1.97. Accordingly, they have been considered.
Applicant Reply
“The claims may be amended by canceling particular claims, by presenting new claims, or by rewriting particular claims as indicated in 37 CFR 1.121(c). The requirements of 37 CFR 1.111(b) must be complied with by pointing out the specific distinctions believed to render the claims patentable over the references in presenting arguments in support of new claims and amendments. . . . The prompt development of a clear issue requires that the replies of the applicant meet the objections to and rejections of the claims. Applicant should also specifically point out the support for any amendments made to the disclosure. See MPEP § 2163.06. . . . An amendment which does not comply with the provisions of 37 CFR 1.121(b), (c), (d), and (h) may be held not fully responsive. See MPEP § 714.” MPEP § 714.02. Generic statements or listing of numerous paragraphs do not “specifically point out the support for” claim amendments. “With respect to newly added or amended claims, applicant should show support in the original disclosure for the new or amended claims. See, e.g., Hyatt v. Dudas, 492 F.3d 1365, 1370, n.4, 83 USPQ2d 1373, 1376, n.4 (Fed. Cir. 2007) (citing MPEP § 2163.04 which provides that a ‘simple statement such as ‘applicant has not pointed out where the new (or amended) claim is supported, nor does there appear to be a written description of the claim limitation ‘___’ in the application as filed’ may be sufficient where the claim is a new or amended claim, the support for the limitation is not apparent, and applicant has not pointed out where the limitation is supported.’)” MPEP § 2163(II)(A).
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph:
The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the applicant regards as his invention.
Claims 26-27 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) or 35 U.S.C. 112 (pre-AIA ), second paragraph, as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor, or for pre-AIA the applicant regards as the invention.
Generally: separately listed claim elements are construed as distinct components, that all claim terms must be given weight, there is presumed to be a difference in meaning and scope when different words or phrases are used in separate claims, and repeated and consistent descriptions in the specification indicate the proper scope of a claimed term. “[C]laims must ‘conform to the invention as set forth in the remainder of the specification and the terms and phrases used in the claims must find clear support or antecedent basis in the description so that the meaning of the terms in the claims may be ascertainable by reference to the description.’ 37 C.F.R. § 1.75(d)(1).” Phillips v. AWH Corp., 415 F.3d 1303, 1316 (Fed. Cir. 2005) (as cited in MPEP § 2111). Therefore, use of two different terms in the claims that both rely on the description of a single structure in the Specification may render at least one term indefinite because there is no way to determine which term should be construed in view of the description of the single structure.
Claim 26 recites “the first entangled measurement and the second entangled measurement are performed on a same copy of an ansatz wavefunction associated with the hybrid quantum-classical algorithm[.]” The claim limitation implies that an entangled measurement is carried out on multiple wave functions. But the Specification explains “A VQE algorithm can be initialized with one or more assumptions regarding the form of a target wavefunction. Based on the one or more assumptions, an ansatz with one or more tunable parameters can be constructed and a quantum circuit 124 capable of producing the ansatz can be designed. Throughout execution of the VQE algorithm, the ansatz parameters can be variationally adjusted to minimize the expectation value of resulting Hamiltonian matrix.” Spec. ¶41. Based on this description, the “copy” of the ansatz wave function refers to constructed quantum circuit. This is also consistent with the description in paragraph 62 (“As shown in FIG. 6, the hybrid quantum-classical algorithm 122 can be incorporated into the quantum circuit 124 (e.g., first example quantum circuit 124a) as, for example, a copy of one or more ansatz wavefunctions of the one or more hybrid quantum-classical algorithms 122.”) Since the claim appears to recite a direct measurement of an ansatz wave function, but the supporting description explains creation of a quantum circuit using the ansatz wave function, which would then be measured, the scope of the claim is not clear.
Claim 27 recites “The system of claim 1, wherein the second entangled measurement is performed between the reinitialized qubit and additional qubit[.]” There is no antecedent basis for “and additional qubit[.]” This makes it unclear whether the language introduces a new “additional qubit” or if the additional qubit refers to an earlier recited qubit (e.g. to “at least one qubit associated with the first entangled measurement[.]”
Claim 27 recites “wherein the reinitialized qubit and the additional qubit are not directly connected according to a qubit topology of a quantum computer configured to execute the at least one quantum circuit.” It is not clear whether “qubit are not directly connected according to a qubit topology of a quantum computer” refers to qubits that are not entangled before the entangling operation, or qubits that are not somehow otherwise connected (i.e. via an EM field.) The Specification only mentions qubits being “not physically connected directly” without providing any objective measure of a physical connection between qubits. See Spec. ¶29 (“Given the problems with other implementations of compiling quantum circuits (e.g., the addition of numerous SWAP gates can increase operation costs, reduce efficiency, and/or result in an increased likelihood of errors); the present disclosure can be implemented to produce a solution to one or more of these problems by employing mid-circuit operations to measure entangled states between qubits that are not physically connected directly to each other within the quantum computer hardware.”) The Specification uses the term “connection” in reference to electrical and EM connections, but not in the context of omitted connections. See e.g. Spec. ¶44. (“the wiring network can facilitate the transmission of control signals via a direct electrical connection and/or electromagnetic radiation (e.g., optical, microwave, and/or low-frequency signals).” All of this makes it unclear what is meant by qubits that are “not directly connected” to one another.
All dependent claims are rejected as containing the limitations of the claims from which they depend.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
Claim 1, 3-7, 9-11, 13-16, 18-21, 23-25 and 27 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hamamura (Efficient evaluation of quantum observables using entangled measurements; 2019) and Yirka (Qubit-efficient entanglement spectroscopy using qubit resets, Aug 2021)
1. A system, comprising: at least one processor; and at least one memory that stores executable instructions that, when executed by the at least one processor, facilitate performance of operations, comprising (Hamamura teaches “In this paper, we focus on variational quantum eigensolver (VQE), which is a quantum-classical hybrid algorithm proposed by Peruzzo et al.8 to compute eigenvalues and eigenvectors of matrices such as Hamiltonians. VQE has been applied in various fields such as quantum chemistry and is extensively being studied because NISQ computers can handle only short-depth circuits and it is necessary to combine them with classical computers.” Hamamura P. 1, Col. 1-2. “We ran MCQD on Intel Xeon E5-2690 CPU with a 1-hour time limit and were able to observe the maximum cliques for all Pauli graphs except NH3 Parity and Bravyi–Kitaev.” Hamamura P. 3-4. The person of ordinary skill in the art would understand the “classical computers” of Hamamura as referencing a standard computer including a processor to execute code stored in memory.) generating quantum circuits configured to perform entangled measurements corresponding to Pauli strings of a Hamiltonian within a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm, (Hamamura teaches “A qubit Hamiltonian can be written as a linear combination of tensor products of Pauli operators including the identity operator; i.e., A =Pn i=1 aiPi, where the tensor product of Pauli operators Pi ∈ { σx, σy, σz, I }⊗N is referred to as Pauli string.” Hamamura p.1 col. 2. “The first phase is to choose entangled measurements (e.g., Bell measurements and omega measurements). We would present details of the Bell measurements in the Method section and present other two-qubit entangled measurements in Appendix B of the Supplementary Information. One constructs quantum circuits corresponding to the entangled measurements. This task can be done by using simultaneous diagonalization as a preprocessing technique. We can alternatively use other methods based on Clifford gates, which was proposed recently. Because quantum circuits can be generated in advance in this phase, therefore, the cost of circuit construction in the next phase can be reduced.” Hamamura P. 3 col. 1. Hamamura teaches: “In this paper, we show that entangled measurements enhance the efficiency of evaluation of observables, both theoretically and experimentally by taking into account the covariance effect, which may affect the quality of evaluation of observables.” Hamamura P. 1, Abstract. “We introduce a new grouping approach for Pauli strings that uses not only TPB but also entangled measurements such as Bell measurements to reduce the number of measurements. For instance, the expectation values of σxσx, σyσy, and σzσz cannot be obtained simultaneously from TPB measurements. It requires three types of measurements to compute the expectation values of σxσx, σyσy, and σzσz; however, these Pauli strings can be measured jointly using Bell measurement (see the Methods section for details). Simultaneous diagonalization provides a joint measurement using entangled observables.” Hamamura P. 3. While parallel measurements reads on measuring of more than one “entangled” states, note that Hamamura expressly teaches measuring Pauli strings jointly using bell measurements.) wherein the generating comprises configuring at least one quantum circuit to: perform a first entangled measurement corresponding to a first subset of the Pauli strings; (“Measurements by TPB are separable measurements. We propose taking advantage of entangled measurements. We introduce a new grouping approach for Pauli strings that uses not only TPB but also entangled measurements such as Bell measurements to reduce the number of measurements. For instance, the expectation values of σxσx, σyσy, and σzσz cannot be obtained simultaneously from TPB measurements. It requires three types of measurements to compute the expectation values of σxσx, σyσy, and σzσz; however, these Pauli strings can be measured jointly using Bell measurement (see the Methods section for details).” Hamamura P. 3 col. 1.) execute a mid-circuit measurement operation that measures at least one qubit associated with the first entangled measurement during execution of the at least one quantum circuit; execute a mid-circuit reset operation after the mid-circuit measurement operation that reinitializes the at least one qubit into a reinitialized qubit during the execution of the at least one quantum circuit; and perform a second entangled measurement corresponding to a second subset of the Pauli strings after the mid-circuit reset operation using the reinitialized qubit and during the execution of the at least one quantum circuit. (As shown above, Hamamura teaches entangled measurements, each corresponding to Pauli strings.
The previously cited art does not teach a mid-circuit operation.
Yirka teaches “Our second algorithm comes from the observation that in the 4k qe-HT, the third register stays idle after the first state preparation. So, instead of preparing two copies simultaneously, we modify the algorithm to prepare one copy, reset the qubits associated with sub system B, and reuse them to prepare successive copies. This saves k qubits.” Yirka P. 6 “Our first qubit-efficient variant is given in Fig. 6. The circuit width is 6k qubits, so we refer to this algorithm as the 6k qe-TCT. . . . To further reduce the number of qubits, we observe that it is unnecessary to simultaneously prepare both copies needed by the current one. For example, after preparing |v1> it is sufficient to first prepare |v’1>, interact the B subsystems of those copies, and then prepare |vn> and interact the A subsystems. The register containing the B subsystem of |v’1> can be measured, reset, and reused to prepare |vn>. In this way, four such registers is sufficient.” Yirka pp.6-7. (Note that some symbols in the document do not lend well to OCR. See original document for clarity.) As explained under Figure 4, “[a] break in a while followed by a new |0> indicates a reset.” Together with figures 6 and 7, the citation above teaches iterations of measurements and resets. While Hamamura teaches entangled measurements, note that the connections shown in Figures 6 and 7 using CNOT and Hadamard gates indicate several of the adjacent bits are entangled before measurement. Figure 6 and 7 are included below for clarity.
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It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date to combine the teaching of Yirka because this is part of a technique for mitigating errors caused by noise on noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) devices. See Yirka Abstract.
3. The system of claim 1, the operations further comprising: executing a grouping algorithm to sort the Pauli strings into a plurality of groups and assigning the entangled measurements to the plurality of groups. (“If Pauli strings are commutative, it implies they are compatible; i.e., they are jointly measurable. McClean et al.25 suggested a grouping of jointly measurable Pauli strings by using sequential measurements and pointed out the covariance effect. Bravyi et al.26 introduced the notion of grouping based on a tensor product basis (TPB). . . . Incompatibility by TPB can be represented by a graph called Pauli graph. It has been known that the grouping of Pauli strings can be reduced to the coloring problem of the Pauli graph.” Hamamura P. 2, col. 1. “Measurements by TPB are separable measurements. We propose taking advantage of entangled measurements. We introduce a new grouping approach for Pauli strings that uses not only TPB but also entangled measurements such as Bell measurements to reduce the number of measurements.” Hamamura P. 3, col. 1. “It consists of two phases: choosing a set of entangled observables and grouping of Pauli strings with TPB and the set of entangled observables.” Hamamura P. 3 col. 1.)
4. The system of claim 3, wherein the entangled measurements comprise at least one member selected from the group consisting of a Bell basis entangled measurement and an omega basis entangled measurement. (“The first phase is to choose entangled measurements (e.g., Bell measurements and omega measurements).” Hamamura P. 3, col. 1.)
5. The system of claim 3, the operations further comprising: generating a quantum sub-circuit configured to perform one or more of the entangled measurements, wherein the generating the quantum sub-circuit is based on a measurement basis of a quantum computer applicable to execute the quantum circuits and a qubit connectivity graph that characterizes a qubit topology of the quantum computer. (As best understood, the claimed “qubit connectivity graph that characterizes a qubit topology of the quantum computer” refers to some portion of the representation of the quantum circuit. The Specification does not include any drawings of the claimed “qubit connectivity graph,” only shown the claim element as black box 306 of Figure 3. Further, the Specification explains the qubit connectivity graph consistent with the graphical representations of Figure 2. See Spec. ¶54 (“For instance, the one or more qubit connectivity graphs 306 can describe the physical qubits comprised within the one or more quantum computers 108 and/or the qubit connectivity employed by the one or more quantum computers 108. For instance, qubits of the one or more quantum computers 108 can be represented as nodes within the one or more qubit connectivity graphs 306, with lines between nodes representing qubit connections. In various embodiments, the one or more qubit connectivity graphs 306 can be entered into the system 100 via the one or more input devices 106 and/or the quantum computers 108.”) See also Spec. ¶56. See Hamamura Fig. 2 showing the CNOT and Hadamard gates on lines representing bits |00>. Figure 2 of Hamamura further shows measurements of the entangled states. The claimed “sub-circuit” reads on any sub-part of the graph in Figure 2 of Hamamura.)
6. The system of claim 5, the operations further comprising: generating the quantum circuits based on the plurality of groups, the measurement basis, (The Specification only describes “the measurement basis” as using two-bit measurements with entangled measurements. See Spec. ¶56. See also ¶¶57, 62 and 63 describing a “two qubit measurement basis.” Hamamura teaches “One constructs quantum circuits corresponding to the entangled measurements.” Hamamura P. 3, col. 1. “It consists of two phases: choosing a set of entangled observables and grouping of Pauli strings with TPB and the set of entangled observables.” Hamamura P. 3 col. 1. “TPB, TPB+BELL, TPB+2Q, and ALL denote the groupings using TPB, TPB and Bell measurements, TPB and all two-qubit entangled measurements, and all measurements, respectively.” Hamamura P. 4, col. 1. “We observed that the entangled measurements are effective in reducing the number of measurements of Pauli strings. However, there exist various errors in using NISQ computers, especially the two-qubit gate error that is generally much larger than a one-qubit error. In the next section, we discuss the effects of additional CNOT gates introduced in entangled measurements. . . . Effect of additional CNOT gates . . . Entangled measurements require additional two-qubit gates. We evaluate the effect of additional CNOT gates for a Bell measurement in one of the simplest models, two-qubit antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model[.]” Hamamura P. 4 col. 1-2. Note here that different gates are used for entangled measurements.) the qubit connectivity graph, (See Algorithm 1 of Hamamura.) and an injective map that characterizes a relationship between logical qubits of the quantum circuits and physical qubits of the quantum computer, (The claimed “injective map that characterizes a relationship between logical qubits and physical qubits” is not shown in the figures or described in the Specification. An “injective map,” refers to an image of what is commonly called a “one to one” relationship. In other words, this language refers to generating a quantum circuit based on a relationship between a single physical qubit and its corresponding logical representation. See Hamamura Fig. 2 showing a logical representation of a quantum circuit representing at least part of a generated physical circuit used in the experiments described in the paper.) wherein the quantum sub-circuit is included in at least one of the quantum circuits. (Absent some structural limitation on the claimed “sub-circuit” this term reads on any part of the quantum circuit of Hamamura Fig. 2.)
27. The system of claim 1, wherein the second entangled measurement is performed between the reinitialized qubit and additional qubit and wherein the reinitialized qubit and the additional qubit are not directly connected according to a qubit topology of a quantum computer configured to execute the at least one quantum circuit. (See Figures 6-7 in Yirka. Note that the lines are not “directly connected according to the qubit topology.”)
Claims 26 and 28 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hamamura, Yirka and Goings (Variational Quantum Eigensolver (VQE) Example; 12/02/2021 on Wayback Machine)
26. The system of claim 1, wherein the first entangled measurement and the second entangled measurement are performed on a same copy of an ansatz wavefunction associated with the hybrid quantum-classical algorithm.
Hamamura teaches “VQE minimizes the expectation value of the input operator by varying the quantum state |ψ(θ)⟩ with parameters θ.” Mamamura P. 1.
The previously cited art does not teach ansatz wave function.
Goings teaches “Here’s the big, overarching plan: 1. Put the Hamiltonian in the computational (qubit) basis. 2. Obtain a variational ansatz to parameterize the wave function. 3. Represent this ansatz as a quantum circuit. 4. Given this circuit, measure the expectation value of Hamiltonian (energy). 5. Vary the circuit parameters until the energy is minimized.” Goings PP. 2-3. “This ansatz will eventually be encoded by the quantum circuit.” Goings P. 10.
It would have been obvious to combine the teaching of Goings before the effective filing date because using an ansatz wave function is an efficient way to create a classical quantum hybrid algorithm.
28. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one quantum circuit is configured to implement at least one of a teleportation operation or a SWAP operation based on the mid-circuit measurement operation and the mid-circuit reset operation, and wherein the second entangled measurement is performed based on the at least one of the teleportation operation or the SWAP operation.
The previously cited art does not teach SWAP operations.
Goings teaches “It would be even better if we could relate the above expression to a single type of Pauli measurement, that is, measuring the spin of just one qubit. Then we don’t need to have multiple measurement apparatus.” Goings P. 15. “Thankfully, there is a way to do this. The trick is to apply an additional unitary transformation at the end of the circuit so that, by measuring the spin of the top qubit, we can obtain any Pauli measurement. In our case, that means relating each of the quantities to the expected value of by some appropriate unitary operator.” Goings P. 16. “For example, the simplest case is if you want to measure Z1XI. Then you don’t have to do anything: . . . But if you want to measure Y1XI then . . . For IXZ0, we have to apply the SWAP gate[.]”
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date to one of ordinary skill in the art to combine Goings for this aspect of the claimed invention because the SWAP gate can reduce the need for direct measurements.
For rejections of claims 7, 11, 16, and 21, see rejection of claim 1. With respect to claims 11 and 16, note that Yirka teaches several iterations of measuring and resetting entangled bits as shown in the art cited in the rejection of claim 1.
For rejections of claims 9, 13, 18, and 23, see rejection of claim 3.
For rejections of claims 10 and 25, see the combination of rejections under claims 5 and 6.
For rejections of claim 14, 19, and 24, see rejection of claim 5.
For rejections of claims 15 and 20, see rejection of claim 6.
Claims 2, 8, 12, 17, and 22 are cancelled.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 06/17/2026have been fully considered but they are not persuasive.
Rejections under § 103:
Applicant notes the deficiencies of the references individually without addressing the combined teachings of the references.
The Remarks assert that the combined teachings of Hamamura and Yirka would not teach the claimed invention. Rem. 12. But the Remarks do not clearly explain exactly which aspect of the independent claims would be non-obvious over the combination. Further, many of the arguments appear to gloss over the routine nature of certain claimed aspects, giving the impression that one of ordinary skill in the art would not routinely combine these elements in a quantum circuit. Ultimately the argument that generating a quantum circuit “in which a qubit participating in a first Hamiltonian Pauli-string entangled measurement is measured, reset, and subsequently reused” within the same circuit is unconvincing because it reads on the combined teachings of the references.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
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PAUL M. KNIGHTPrimary ExaminerArt Unit 2148
/PAUL M KNIGHT/
Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2148
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