Enhanced Quantum Circuit Cutting Framework for Sampling Overhead Reduction

Abstract: The recent quantum circuit cutting technique enables simulating large quantum circuits on distributed smaller devices, significantly extending the capabilities of current noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ) hardware. However, this method incurs substantial classical postprocessing and additional quantum resource demands, as both postprocessing complexity and sampling overhead scale exponentially with the number of cuts introduced. In this work, we propose an enhanced circuit cutting framework ShotQC with effective sampling overhead reduction. It effectively reduces sampling overhead through two key optimizations: shot distribution and cut parameterization. The former employs an adaptive Monte Carlo method to dynamically allocate more quantum resources to subcircuit configurations that contribute more to variance in the final outcome. The latter leverages additional degrees of freedom in postprocessing to further suppress variance. By integrating these optimization methods, ShotQC achieves significant reductions in sampling overhead without increasing classical postprocessing complexity, as demonstrated on a range of benchmark circuits.