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 .
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 11, 13 and 14 are 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 applications subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 112, the applicant), regards as the invention.
As per claim 11, the claim contains unclear dependency language. The recited phrase “inverse of the eigenvalues,” contain inconsistent mathematical notation. Applicant should specify “inverse of the eigenvalues of λj.” Further, applicant should clarify what makes the HHL algorithm “approximate,” such as approximation due to nR-bit eigenvalue estimation or truncation of higher-body Hamiltonian terms as define in Fig. 2.
As per claim 13, it recites “when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the method of claim 11.” However, claim 11 requires use of a quantum processing unit, thus, it is unclear whether the claimed “computer” directly performs quantum operations or controls a quantum processing unit to perform them.
Same as claim 14. It is suggested that Applicants clarify that the instructions cause a classical computer or controller to control a quantum processing unit to perform the method of claim 11.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 101
35 U.S.C. 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claim 14 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 101 because the claimed invention is directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claim(s) does/do not fall within at least one of the four categories of patent eligible subject matter because claim 14 recites "A computer-readable medium comprising instructions which…". The specification is silent regarding the medium
which could include a signal used to provide machine instructions i.e. machine-readable
signal. A signal does not fall within one of the enumerated statutory categories (i.e. process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter). Thus, claim 14 as drafted recites non-statutory subject matter and appropriate correction is required. It is suggested to recite "non-transitory machine-readable storage medium".
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 102
The following is a quotation of the appropriate paragraphs of 35 U.S.C. 102 that form the basis for the rejections under this section made in this Office action:
A person shall be entitled to a patent unless –
(a)(1) the claimed invention was patented, described in a printed publication, or in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public before the effective filing date of the claimed invention.
Claims 1-5, 7-9 and 11-14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 102(a)(1) as being anticipated by Wang et al. “Quantum Fast Poisson Solver: the algorithm and modular circuit design” 2019.
As per claim 1, Wang discloses a quantum processing unit for carrying out a HHL algorithm (a quantum circuit/algorithm), the quantum processing unit comprising:
an ancilla qubit (Register A is used as the ancilla register; see Sec. III, Fig. 1: “Register A is used to store approximated angular coefficients for the controlled rotation operation.”);
a plurality of register qubits (Register E is used to store binary eigenvalues; see Sec. III, Fig. 1: “Register E is used to store the approximated eigenvalues.”); and
a plurality of memory qubits (Register B is used to store the coefficients of the right-hand side);
wherein the ancilla qubit is connected only to the plurality of register qubits (Ancilla register A is controlled by register E during AQE; see Sec. III.B, Figs. 9, 10); and the plurality of memory qubits is connected only to the plurality of register qubits (Register B interacts with register E during QPE/inverse QPE); and wherein the ancilla qubit is connected to all of the register qubits in the plurality of register qubits ancilla register A undergoes controlled Ry rotations based on register E, encoding 1/λ in amplitude (Sec. III.B, Figs. 9, 10).
As per claim 2, Wang et al, discloses wherein the HHL algorithm solves a system of linear equations defined by A x) =|b), where |x) is the solution vector, matrix A defines the coefficients (as coefficient matrix) and |b) defines the constant terms (as constant vector), and wherein the quantum processing unit is configured to:
store the constant terms |b) and the solution vector |x) in the plurality of memory qubits; - encode the nR-binary representation of the eigenvalues of A in the plurality of register qubits, where nR is the number of register qubits (see Sec. III, Fig. 1: “Register E is used to store the approximated eigenvalues. Its number of qubits is m=2n+2+f…”). QPE encodes eigenvalues in binary form in Register E (Sec. III.A, Figs. 2, 5, 6); and
store the inverse of the eigenvalues of λj in the ancilla qubit (Controlled rotation is performed based on the eigenvalues stored in Register E, and the ancilla (Register A) encodes the amplitude proportional to 1/λ (Sec. III.B, Eq. 13-15, Figs. 9, 10).
As per claim 3, Wang et al discloses initialize the ancilla qubit and each of the register qubits to the |0) state and initialize the memory qubits to a state |b) representing the constant terms (the circuit has three main registers, i.e. register B, E and A. Register B is used to store the coefficients of the right hand side of Eq. (3);
apply a quantum phase estimation algorithm to the register qubits and memory qubits in order to decompose |b) in the eigenbasis of A and find the corresponding eigenvalues (Phase estimation is used to approximate the eigenvalues of the discretized matrix A and entangle the states encoding the eigenvalues with the corresponding eigenstates [27]. The overall circuit for phase estimation is shown in Fig. 2.” See Sec. III.A));
perform a linear map codifying the inverse of the eigenvalues λj into the amplitude of the ancilla qubit by applying a plurality of single qubit gates and a plurality of controlled quantum gates to the ancilla qubit, each controlled quantum gate rotating the quantum state of the ancilla qubit around the y-axis depending on the state of one of the register qubits (calculating the rotation angular coefficients and performing the controlled Ry operation." See Sec. III.B, Figs. 9, 10). “The probability amplitude of 1/λj would be produced by implementing the controlled Ry rotation…”);
apply an inverse quantum phase estimation algorithm to uncompute the estimate eigenvalues stored in the register qubits (After controlled rotation, the uncomputation is implemented to evolve the state of Registers B, E and A back to the initial state” see Sec. III.B, pipeline in Fig. 1); and
measure the ancilla qubit in the Z-axis to determine whether linear map was successful (performing the measurement operation. If the measurement result of the ancillary qubit is (1⟩), then we know the final state is … namely the solution state for the Poisson equation." (Sec. III.B page 12).
As per claim 4, Wang et al., discloses each of the memory qubits in the plurality of memory qubits is directly connected to one other memory qubit in the plurality of memory qubits (Register B serves as both input (|b⟩) and output (|x⟩) memory).
As per claim 5, Wang et al., discloses wherein one of the memory qubits in the plurality of memory qubits is connected to all of the register qubits in the plurality of register qubits (Ancilla interacts with register qubits in controlled rotation).
As per claim 7, Wang et al., discloses wherein the register qubits are interconnected such that all of the register qubits are connected directly or indirectly via other register qubits (Ancilla controlled by all register qubits during AQE (Figs. 9, 10)).
As per claim 8, Wang et al., discloses, wherein the register qubits are interconnected such that the register qubits and connections between register qubits form a two-degree chain (full HHL pipeline detailed (Sec. III, Figs. 1, 2, 9)).
As per claim 9, Wang et al., discloses, wherein the ancilla qubit, each register qubit in the plurality of register qubits and each memory qubit in the plurality of memory qubits are logical qubits, and wherein each logical qubit comprises one or more physical qubits (Amplitude amplification see (Sec. III.D, Table 1, refs)).
As per claim 11 Wang et al. discloses an approximate HHL algorithm for a system of linear equations defined by A x)=|b), where |x) is the solution vector, matrix A defines the coefficients and |b) defines the constant terms, the method using the quantum processing unit of claim 1 and comprising:
initializing the ancilla qubit and each of the register qubits to the |0) state and initialize the memory qubits to a state |b), which represents the constant terms (Registers A (ancilla) and E (register) initialized to (Registers A (ancilla) and E (register) initialized to (b⟩) (Sec. III, Fig. 1));
applying a quantum phase estimation algorithm to the register qubits and memory qubits in order to decompose |b) in the eigenbasis of A and find the corresponding eigenvalues (via QPE applied to registers B and E, decomposing (b⟩) in eigenbasis of A (Sec. III.A, Figs. 2, 5, 6);
performing a linear map codifying the inverse of the eigenvalues into the amplitude of the ancilla qubit by applying a plurality of single qubit gates and a plurality of controlled quantum gates to the ancilla qubit, each controlled quantum gate rotating the quantum state of the ancilla qubit around the y-axis depending on the state of one of the register qubits (Controlled Ry gates applied to ancilla (Register A), controlled by register qubits (Register E), encoding 1/λ in amplitude (Sec. III.B, Figs. 9, 10));
- applying an inverse quantum phase estimation algorithm to uncompute the estimated eigenvalues stored in the register qubits (Inverse QPE applied after AQE to disentangle register E (Sec. III, Fig. 1, text); and
- measuring the ancilla qubit in the Z-axis to determine whether linear map was successful (Measurement of ancilla (Register A) in computational basis to determine success (Sec. III.B, Eq. 7, Table 3)
As per claim 12 Wang et al. discloses A hybrid classical-quantum computer system comprising a classical processing unit and a quantum processing unit, wherein the classical processing unit configured to apply control signals to the quantum processing unit to cause the quantum processing unit to perform the method of claim 11 ((describes running circuits on a quantum virtual computing system (Sec. IV), which is controlled by classical computers; classical processor sends instructions to quantum system (e.g., Sunway TaihuLight supercomputer, Origin Quantum Computing Technology)).
As per claim 13, Wang et al. discloses A computer program product comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the method of claim 11 (via providing QRunes code for the circuits (Sec. IV, Tab. 2: “All the codes of the circuits are provided as the attachment files of the present paper… written using quantum assembly language of QRunes”)).
As per claim 14, Wang et al. discloses A computer-readable medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to perform the method of claim 11 (provides executable code (QRunes) for the HHL circuit; code can be stored on computer-readable media (Sec. IV, Tab. 2, Ref. [39], [40])).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 6 and 10 are objected to as being dependent upon a rejected base claim but would be allowable if rewritten in independent form including all of the limitations of the base claim and any intervening claims.
Pertinent Prior art
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure.
WO-2023170334-A1 PINA discloses a quantum device and method for finding the principal eigenvector/eigenvalue of a network matrix (for centrality/influence), using quantum phase estimation and measurement.
WO-2023180483-A1 PALACIOS discloses an improved quantum circuit for solving linear equations, featuring optimized quantum phase estimation and controlled rotation modules. The circuit reduces the number of required qubits and gates, addresses error propagation, and is compatible with hybrid classical-quantum computation. It enables encoding of the input vector, estimation of matrix eigenvalues, amplitude encoding of the solution, and final measurement all with improved efficiency and accuracy.
US 12701063 B2 Saravanan et al. discloses a method comprises manipulating quantum states of qubits of the quantum computing device, the qubits arranged into a first and a second register each in equal superposition, the qubits of the first register conditionally influencing the qubits of the second register using operators representing the network. The method performs a first measurement on the qubits of the first register to estimate a principal eigenvalue, then performs a subsequent second measurement on the qubits in the second register and uses the results of the second measurement corresponding to the principal eigenvalue to calculate the network parameter. However, there is no explicit ancilla or memory qubits nor HHL specific register structure or topology.
US12299538 B2 Jiang et al. discloses a method for preparing a quantum state of a quantum system register on a quantum computer, wherein the quantum state comprises a superposition of L computational basis states.
US 2022/0343203 A1 Brown et al, describes techniques for optimizing two-qubit gates performance in a quantum circuit of a quantum computing system. A quantum computing system selects qubits in the quantum circuit, a pair of target qubits on which to perform a quantum gate operation. The quantum computing system selects, from the plurality of qubits, a second plurality of qubits on which to introduce an intentional noise. However, there is no explicit disclosure of ancilla-register connectivity; nor exclusive connection scheme.
US-20230153672-A1 Resch et al. discloses a quantum processor that runs a plurality of instances of a quantum program using a separate set of qubits from among the qubits for each instance of the quantum program. The quantum processor then sets quantum states for ancilla qubits from among the qubits based on quantum states of respective groups of associated qubits from the separate sets of qubits. The quantum processor next provides an output of the instances of the quantum program based on the quantum states of the ancilla qubits. Resch et al. teaches general use of ancilla qubits for aggregating quantum state information from multiple program instances on a quantum processor but does not teach or suggest the unique QPU structure, connectivity, or HHL-specific functionality, particularly the arrangement and function of ancilla, register, and memory qubits for the HHL algorithm.
Conclusion
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/LYNDA JASMIN/ Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3629
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