University of Central Florida - Department of Physics

PHYSICS 5650 - Introduction to Quantum Computation

Spring 2005

Lecturer: Eduardo Mucciolo (office in MAP 416, ext 3-1882, e-address: mucciolo physics ucf edu)

Schedule and Location: Mondays,  Wednesdays, and Fridays, 10:30-11:20 am, in the Math and Physics Building, room 204. Office hours: Wednesdays and Fridays, 11:30-12:30 pm.


Credit hours: 3 units.

Prerequisites: Elementary linear algebra and basic calculus. Some knowledge of elementary quantum mechanics will be helpful, but not required. The course is aimed at senior undergraduate or first-year graduate students majoring in any science or engineering field.

Content:

1) Motivation and Overview: quantum bits (qubits), quantum gates and computation, quantum algorithms.

2) Classical Computation: Turing machines, computational complexity, complexity classes.

3) The Basics of Quantum  Mechanics: linear algebra, postulates of Quantum Mechanics, superposition, interference, entanglement, time evolution, phase coherence.

4) Quantum Circuits: qubit operations and quantum gates, universal quantum gates.

5) Quantum Computation: quantum computational complexity, quantum algorithms, Shor's factorization algorithm, search algorithms.

6) Physical Implementations: optical and atomic, nuclear (NMR), solid state, scalability, the decoherence problem.

Textbook: Quantum Computation and Quantum Information, by Michael A. Nielsen and Isaac L. Chuang (Cambridge University Press, 2000). This is a comprehensible and accessible reference to the subject. There are also several very good review articles and lecture notes on the subject. Here is a brief list:

• John Preskill's lecture notes, which can be found in his webpage at http://www.theory.caltech.edu/people/preskill/ . There one also finds many links to other quantum computation resources.
• Michael Nielsen's Summer School lecture notes at http://www.qinfo.org/people/nielsen/qicss.html .
• A. Ekert and R. Jozsa, Quantum computation and Shor's factoring algorithm, Review of Modern Physics 68, 733-753 (1996).

During the course, other relevant references and auxiliary material will be provided.

Grading: The grade will be based on homework (50%) and a final paper (50%). Problem sets will be handed out every two-three weeks. Topics for the final paper will be provided by the instructor.


CALENDAR (tentative)


PROBLEM SETS (pdf files)

NOTES (pdf files)