We propose and implement an algorithm to calculate the norm and reduced density matrices of the antisymmetrized geminal power (AGP) of any rank with polynomial cost. Our method scales quadratically per element of the reduced density matrices. Numerical tests indicate that our method is very fast and capable of treating systems with a few thousand orbitals and hundreds of electrons reliably in double-precision. In addition, we present reconstruction formulae that allows one to decompose higher order reduced density matrices in terms of linear combinations of lower order ones and geminal coefficients, thereby reducing the computational cost significantly.

For variational algorithms on the near term quantum computing hardware, it is highly desirable to use very accurate ansatze with low implementation cost. Recent studies have shown that the antisymmetrized geminal power (AGP) wavefunction can be an excellent starting point for ansatze describing systems with strong pairing correlations, as those occurring in superconductors. In this work, we show how AGP can be efficiently implemented on a quantum computer with circuit depth, number of CNOTs, and number of measurements being linear in system size. Using AGP as the initial reference, we propose and implement a unitary correlator on AGP and benchmark it on the ground state of the pairing Hamiltonian. The results show highly accurate ground state energies in all correlation regimes of this model Hamiltonian.

Single-reference methods such as Hartree–Fock-based coupled cluster theory are well known for their accuracy and efficiency for weakly correlated systems. For strongly correlated systems, more sophisticated methods are needed. Recent studies have revealed the potential of the antisymmetrized geminal power (AGP) as an excellent initial reference for the strong correlation problem. While these studies improved on AGP by linear correlators, we explore some non-linear exponential Ansätze in this paper. We investigate two approaches in particular. Similar to Wahlen-Strothman et al. [Phys. Rev. B 91, 041114(R) (2015)], we show that the similarity transformed Hamiltonian with a Hilbert-space Jastrow operator is summable to all orders and can be solved over AGP by projecting the Schrödinger equation. The second approach is based on approximating the unitary pair-hopper Ansatz recently proposed for application on a quantum computer. We report benchmark numerical calculations against the ground state of the pairing Hamiltonian for both of these approaches.

Electronic structure methods typically benefit from symmetry breaking and restoration, specially in the strong correlation regime. The same goes for Ansätze on a quantum computer. We develop a unitary coupled cluster method on the antisymmetrized geminal power (AGP)—a state formally equivalent to the number-projected Bardeen–Cooper–Schrieffer wavefunction. We demonstrate our method for the single-band Fermi–Hubbard Hamiltonian in one and two dimensions. We also explore post-selection as a state preparation step to obtain correlated AGP and prove that it scales no worse than O(√M) in the number of measurements, thereby making it a less expensive alternative to gauge integration to restore particle number symmetry.

The antisymmetrized geminal power (AGP) is equivalent to the number projected Bardeen–Cooper–Schrieffer (PBCS) wave function. It is also an elementary symmetric polynomial (ESP) state. We generalize previous research on deterministically implementing the Dicke state to a state preparation algorithm for an ESP state, or equivalently AGP, on a quantum computer. Our method is deterministic and has polynomial cost, and it does not rely on number symmetry breaking and restoration. We also show that our circuit is equivalent to a disentangled unitary paired coupled cluster operator and a layer of unitary Jastrow operator acting on a single Slater determinant. The method presented herein highlights the ability of disentangled unitary coupled cluster to capture nontrivial entanglement properties that are hardly accessible with traditional Hartree–Fock based electronic structure methods.