Let Quantum Neural Networks Choose Their Own Frequencies
Ben Jaderberg, Antonio A. Gentile, Youssef Achari Berrada, Elvira Shishenina, Vincent E. Elfving
TL;DR
The paper introduces trainable-frequency feature maps (TFFMs) for parameterized quantum circuits, allowing the generator Hamiltonian to adapt its eigenvalues and thus the model's Fourier frequencies during training. This yields TF quantum models with non-uniform spectral gaps and richer spectral representations, demonstrated through cosine-series fitting and a Navier-Stokes wake flow problem solved with differentiable quantum circuits. TF models show improved accuracy over traditional fixed-frequency (FF) models, offering a practical default approach for near-term quantum machine learning. The work suggests broader potential for TF encodings across quantum learning tasks and discusses implementation considerations and future parameterizations.
Abstract
Parameterized quantum circuits as machine learning models are typically well described by their representation as a partial Fourier series of the input features, with frequencies uniquely determined by the feature map's generator Hamiltonians. Ordinarily, these data-encoding generators are chosen in advance, fixing the space of functions that can be represented. In this work we consider a generalization of quantum models to include a set of trainable parameters in the generator, leading to a trainable frequency (TF) quantum model. We numerically demonstrate how TF models can learn generators with desirable properties for solving the task at hand, including non-regularly spaced frequencies in their spectra and flexible spectral richness. Finally, we showcase the real-world effectiveness of our approach, demonstrating an improved accuracy in solving the Navier-Stokes equations using a TF model with only a single parameter added to each encoding operation. Since TF models encompass conventional fixed frequency models, they may offer a sensible default choice for variational quantum machine learning.
