On the Query Complexity of Perfect Gate Discrimination

We investigate the problem of finding the minimum number of queries needed to perfectly identify an unknown quantum gate within a finite set of alternatives, considering both deterministic strategies. For unambiguous gate discrimination, where errors are not tolerated but inconclusive outcomes are allowed, we prove that parallel strategies are sufficient to identify the unknown gate with minimum number of queries and we use this fact to provide upper and lower bounds on the query complexity. In addition, we introduce the notion of generalized t-designs, which includes unitary t-designs and group representations as special cases. For gates forming a generalized t-design we prove that there is no difference between perfect probabilistic and perfect deterministic gate discrimination. Hence, evaluating of the query complexity of perfect discrimination is reduced to the easier problem of evaluating the query complexity of unambiguous discrimination. 1998 ACM Subject Classification J.2 Physical sciences and engineering