Quantum Hamiltonian simulation, which simulates the evolution of quantum systems and probes quantum phenomena, is one of the most promising applications of quantum computing. Recent experimental results suggest that Hamiltonian-oriented analog quantum simulation would be advantageous over circuit-oriented digital quantum simulation in the Noisy Intermediate-Scale Quantum (NISQ) machine era. However, programming analog quantum simulators is much more challenging due to the lack of a unified interface between hardware and software. In this paper, we design and implement SimuQ, the first framework for quantum Hamiltonian simulation that supports Hamiltonian programming and pulse-level compilation to heterogeneous analog quantum simulators. Specifically, in SimuQ, front-end users specify the target quantum system with Hamiltonian Modeling Language, and the Hamiltonian-level programmability of analog quantum simulators is specified through a new abstraction called the abstract analog instruction set (AAIS) and programmed in AAIS Specification Language by hardware providers. Through a solver-based compilation, SimuQ generates executable pulse schedules for real devices to simulate the evolution of desired quantum systems, which is demonstrated on superconducting (IBM), neutral-atom (QuEra), and trapped-ion (IonQ) quantum devices. Moreover, we demonstrate the advantages of exposing the Hamiltonian-level programmability of devices with native operations or interaction-based gates and establish a small benchmark of quantum simulation to evaluate SimuQ's compiler with the above analog quantum simulators.

翻译：量子哈密顿量模拟通过模拟量子系统演化并探测量子现象，是量子计算最具前景的应用之一。近期实验结果表明，在含噪中等规模量子（NISQ）设备时代，面向哈密顿量的模拟量子模拟将优于基于电路的数字量子模拟。然而，由于硬件与软件之间缺乏统一接口，编程模拟量子模拟器更具挑战性。本文设计并实现了SimuQ——首个支持哈密顿量编程与脉冲级编译、面向异构模拟量子模拟器的量子哈密顿量模拟框架。具体而言，在SimuQ中，前端用户通过哈密顿量建模语言指定目标量子系统，而模拟量子模拟器的哈密顿量级可编程性通过称为抽象模拟指令集（AAIS）的新抽象层来定义，并由硬件提供商使用AAIS规范语言进行编程。通过基于求解器的编译，SimuQ为真实设备生成可执行的脉冲调度方案，以模拟所需量子系统的演化，并在超导（IBM）、中性原子（QuEra）和离子阱（IonQ）量子设备上进行了验证。此外，我们展示了利用原生操作或基于相互作用的门暴露设备哈密顿量级可编程性的优势，并建立了小型量子模拟基准测试，用于评估SimuQ编译器在上述模拟量子模拟器上的表现。