Quantum computing from the ground up

Publication date 16 August 2012

computational complexity quantum algorithms quantum computation unitary gates

Basic linear algebra (15Axx) Quantum algorithms and complexity in the theory of computing (68Q12) Complexity classes (hierarchies, relations among complexity classes, etc.) (68Q15) Introductory exposition (textbooks, tutorial papers, etc.) pertaining to quantum theory (81-01) Quantum computation (81P68)

Review text

The book under review aims at providing laymen without prior knowledge in quantum mechanics and not even in linear algebra with a background in basic applications of quantum computing. The book starts with an introduction of classical computer science, including a discussion of Turing machines, Maxwell's demon and the Landauer principle. Chapters 3 and 4 provide some background on mathematics and quantum mechanics and actually constitute the major part of the book. Then, unitary gates are introduced, followed by a discussion of quantum error correction. Finally, the most important quantum algorithms are briefly discussed.NEWLINENEWLINE Overall, the content of the book is much shorter than that of [\textit{M. A. Nielsen} and \textit{I. L. Chuang}, Quantum computation and quantum information. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (2010; Zbl 1288.81001)]. The simple examples in the beginning are explained in very great detail, whereas the really interesting quantum algorithms are only an abbreviated version of the presentation in the book by Nielsen and Chuang without deep explanations. Further literature is rarely referenced and many figures can be found on the internet. The figures illustrating unitary rotations on the Bloch sphere are poorly discussed. Furthermore, the book contains some wrong statements or misleading definitions: For example, on p. 127, entanglement of a particular two-qubit state is wrongly defined, on p. 131 a measurement operator is mixed up with a unitary transformation, Section 5.1.5.13 contains a single gate but is misleadingly grouped together with two qubit gates; this list is certainly not complete. One should carefully think whether it is not advisable to invest into the slightly more expensive book by Nielsen and Chuang [loc. cit.].

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