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Main Authors: De Vriendt, Xeno, Bringewatt, Jacob, Gjonbalaj, Nik O., Ostermann, Stefan, Vodola, Davide, Borregaard, Johannes, Kühn, Michael, Yelin, Susanne F.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2026
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Online Access:https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.11985
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author De Vriendt, Xeno
Bringewatt, Jacob
Gjonbalaj, Nik O.
Ostermann, Stefan
Vodola, Davide
Borregaard, Johannes
Kühn, Michael
Yelin, Susanne F.
author_facet De Vriendt, Xeno
Bringewatt, Jacob
Gjonbalaj, Nik O.
Ostermann, Stefan
Vodola, Davide
Borregaard, Johannes
Kühn, Michael
Yelin, Susanne F.
contents Quantum subspace diagonalization and quantum Krylov algorithms offer a feasible, pre- or early-fault tolerant alternative to quantum phase estimation for using quantum computers to estimate the low-lying spectra of quantum systems. However, despite promising proof-of-principle results, such methods suffer from high sensitivity to noise (including intrinsic sources such as sampling noise), making their utility for realistic industry-relevant problems an open question. To improve the potential applicability of such methods, we introduce a new variant of thresholding for noisy generalized eigenvalue problems that arise in quantum subspace diagonalization that has the potential to better control sensitivity to noise. Our approach leverages eigenvector-preserving transformations (rotations) of the generalized eigenvalue problem prior to thresholding. We study this effect in practical settings by applying this rotation thresholding scheme to an iterative quantum Krylov algorithm for several chemical systems, including the industry-relevant Fe(III)-NTA chelate complex. We develop a particular heuristic to select the rotation angle from noisy data and find for certain systems and noise regimes that the samples required to reach a target error for ground state estimation can be reduced by a factor of up to 100. Furthermore, with oracle access to the optimal transformation, more dramatic improvements are possible and we observe reductions in sample requirements by up to $10^4$, motivating the continued development of methods that can realize these improvements in practice. While we develop our approach in the context of quantum subspace diagonalization, the improved thresholding scheme we develop could be advantageous in any context where one must solve noisy, ill-conditioned generalized eigenvalue problems.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2602_11985
institution arXiv
publishDate 2026
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle A New Angle on Quantum Subspace Diagonalization for Quantum Chemistry
De Vriendt, Xeno
Bringewatt, Jacob
Gjonbalaj, Nik O.
Ostermann, Stefan
Vodola, Davide
Borregaard, Johannes
Kühn, Michael
Yelin, Susanne F.
Quantum Physics
Quantum subspace diagonalization and quantum Krylov algorithms offer a feasible, pre- or early-fault tolerant alternative to quantum phase estimation for using quantum computers to estimate the low-lying spectra of quantum systems. However, despite promising proof-of-principle results, such methods suffer from high sensitivity to noise (including intrinsic sources such as sampling noise), making their utility for realistic industry-relevant problems an open question. To improve the potential applicability of such methods, we introduce a new variant of thresholding for noisy generalized eigenvalue problems that arise in quantum subspace diagonalization that has the potential to better control sensitivity to noise. Our approach leverages eigenvector-preserving transformations (rotations) of the generalized eigenvalue problem prior to thresholding. We study this effect in practical settings by applying this rotation thresholding scheme to an iterative quantum Krylov algorithm for several chemical systems, including the industry-relevant Fe(III)-NTA chelate complex. We develop a particular heuristic to select the rotation angle from noisy data and find for certain systems and noise regimes that the samples required to reach a target error for ground state estimation can be reduced by a factor of up to 100. Furthermore, with oracle access to the optimal transformation, more dramatic improvements are possible and we observe reductions in sample requirements by up to $10^4$, motivating the continued development of methods that can realize these improvements in practice. While we develop our approach in the context of quantum subspace diagonalization, the improved thresholding scheme we develop could be advantageous in any context where one must solve noisy, ill-conditioned generalized eigenvalue problems.
title A New Angle on Quantum Subspace Diagonalization for Quantum Chemistry
topic Quantum Physics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2602.11985