A Practical Quantum Algorithm for the Schur Transform

Abstract: We describe an efficient quantum algorithm for the quantum Schur transform. The Schur transform is an operation on a quantum computer that maps the standard computational basis to a basis composed of irreducible representations of the unitary and symmetric groups. We simplify and extend the algorithm of Bacon, Chuang, and Harrow, and provide a new practical construction as well as sharp theoretical and practical analyses. Our algorithm decomposes the Schur transform on $n$ qubits into $O\left(n^4\log\left(\frac{n}{\epsilon}\right)\right)$ operators in the Clifford+T fault-tolerant gate set and uses exactly $2\lfloor\log_2(n)\rfloor-1$ ancillary qubits. We extend our qubit algorithm to decompose the Schur transform on $n$ qudits of dimension $d$ into $O\left(n^{d^2+2}\log^p\left(\frac{n^{d^2+1}}{\epsilon}\right)\right)$ primitive operators from any universal gate set, for $p\approx3.97$.