Flag Gadgets based on Classical Codes

Abstract: Fault-tolerant syndrome extraction is a key ingredient in implementing fault-tolerant quantum computations. While conventional methods use a number of extra qubits linear in the weight of the syndrome, several improvements have been introduced using flag gadgets. In this work, we develop a framework to design flag gadgets using classical codes. Using this framework we show how to perform fault-tolerant syndrome extraction for any stabilizer code with arbitrary distance using exponentially fewer qubits than conventional methods when qubit measurement and reset are relatively slow compared to a round of error correction. We further take advantage of the saving provided by our construction to fault-tolerantly measure multiple stabilizers using a single gadget, and show that it maintains the same exponential advantage when it is used to fault-tolerantly extract the syndrome of quantum LDPC codes. Using the developed framework we perform computer-assisted search to find several small examples where our constructions reduce the number of qubits required. These small examples may be relevant to near-term experiments on small-scale quantum computers.