Quantum Deep Learning: Sampling Neural Nets with a Quantum Annealer

Abstract: We demonstrate the feasibility of framing a classically learned deep neural network as an energy based model that can be processed on a one-step quantum annealer in order to exploit fast sampling times. We propose approaches to overcome two hurdles for high resolution image classification on a quantum processing unit (QPU): the required number and binary nature of the model states. With this novel method we successfully transfer a convolutional neural network to the QPU and show the potential for classification speedup of at least one order of magnitude.