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Quantum phase estimation with optimal confidence interval using three control qubits

arXiv Quantum Physics
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⚡ Quantum Brief
Researchers Kaur Kristjuhan and Dominic W. Berry introduced a breakthrough in quantum phase estimation, achieving optimal confidence intervals with just three control qubits, making it viable for early fault-tolerant quantum computers. The method leverages a matrix product state with bond dimension 4, delivering highly accurate approximations for systems up to 2²⁴ qubits—far more efficient than prior approaches. The team simplified state preparation using a sequence of three-qubit operations, reducing complexity while maintaining precision for phase estimation tasks like quantum chemistry simulations. When the system dimension is a power of 2, the technique requires only three logical qubits, addressing hardware constraints in near-term fault-tolerant devices. This advance optimizes the discrete prolate spheroidal sequence, a gold standard for confidence intervals, by cutting resource demands without sacrificing performance.
Quantum phase estimation with optimal confidence interval using three control qubits

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Quantum Physics arXiv:2601.16474 (quant-ph) [Submitted on 23 Jan 2026] Title:Quantum phase estimation with optimal confidence interval using three control qubits Authors:Kaur Kristjuhan, Dominic W. Berry View a PDF of the paper titled Quantum phase estimation with optimal confidence interval using three control qubits, by Kaur Kristjuhan and 1 other authors View PDF Abstract:Quantum phase estimation is an important routine in many quantum algorithms, particularly for estimating the ground state energy in quantum chemistry simulations. This estimation involves applying powers of a unitary to the ground state, controlled by an auxiliary state prepared on a control register. In many applications the goal is to provide a confidence interval for the phase estimate, and optimal performance is provided by a discrete prolate spheroidal sequence. We show how to prepare the corresponding state in a far more efficient way than prior work. We find that a matrix product state representation with a bond dimension of 4 is sufficient to give a highly accurate approximation for all dimensions tested, up to $2^{24}$. This matrix product state can be efficiently prepared using a sequence of simple three-qubit operations. When the dimension is a power of 2, the phase estimation can be performed with only three qubits for the control register, making it suitable for early-generation fault-tolerant quantum computers with a limited number of logical qubits. Subjects: Quantum Physics (quant-ph) Cite as: arXiv:2601.16474 [quant-ph] (or arXiv:2601.16474v1 [quant-ph] for this version) https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2601.16474 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration) Submission history From: Kaur Kristjuhan [view email] [v1] Fri, 23 Jan 2026 06:05:11 UTC (109 KB) Full-text links: Access Paper: View a PDF of the paper titled Quantum phase estimation with optimal confidence interval using three control qubits, by Kaur Kristjuhan and 1 other authorsView PDFTeX Source view license Current browse context: quant-ph new | recent | 2026-01 References & Citations INSPIRE HEP NASA ADSGoogle Scholar Semantic Scholar export BibTeX citation Loading... BibTeX formatted citation × loading... Data provided by: Bookmark Bibliographic Tools Bibliographic and Citation Tools Bibliographic Explorer Toggle Bibliographic Explorer (What is the Explorer?) Connected Papers Toggle Connected Papers (What is Connected Papers?) Litmaps Toggle Litmaps (What is Litmaps?) scite.ai Toggle scite Smart Citations (What are Smart Citations?) Code, Data, Media Code, Data and Media Associated with this Article alphaXiv Toggle alphaXiv (What is alphaXiv?) Links to Code Toggle CatalyzeX Code Finder for Papers (What is CatalyzeX?) DagsHub Toggle DagsHub (What is DagsHub?) GotitPub Toggle Gotit.pub (What is GotitPub?) Huggingface Toggle Hugging Face (What is Huggingface?) Links to Code Toggle Papers with Code (What is Papers with Code?) ScienceCast Toggle ScienceCast (What is ScienceCast?) Demos Demos Replicate Toggle Replicate (What is Replicate?) Spaces Toggle Hugging Face Spaces (What is Spaces?) Spaces Toggle TXYZ.AI (What is TXYZ.AI?) Related Papers Recommenders and Search Tools Link to Influence Flower Influence Flower (What are Influence Flowers?) Core recommender toggle CORE Recommender (What is CORE?) Author Venue Institution Topic About arXivLabs arXivLabs: experimental projects with community collaborators arXivLabs is a framework that allows collaborators to develop and share new arXiv features directly on our website. Both individuals and organizations that work with arXivLabs have embraced and accepted our values of openness, community, excellence, and user data privacy. arXiv is committed to these values and only works with partners that adhere to them. Have an idea for a project that will add value for arXiv's community? Learn more about arXivLabs. Which authors of this paper are endorsers? | Disable MathJax (What is MathJax?)

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energy-climate
quantum-algorithms
quantum-chemistry
quantum-computing
quantum-hardware

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Source: arXiv Quantum Physics