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arXiv:0810.3647quant-ph

Exact quantum lower bound for Grover's problem

Catalin Dohotaru, Peter Hoyer

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Abstract

One of the most important quantum algorithms ever discovered is Grover's algorithm for searching an unordered set. We give a new lower bound in the query model which proves that Grover's algorithm is exactly optimal. Similar to existing methods for proving lower bounds, we bound the amount of information we can gain from a single oracle query, but we bound this information in terms of angles. This allows our proof to be simple, self-contained, based on only elementary mathematics, capturing our intuition, while obtaining at the same an exact bound.

arXiv comments
7 pages, no figures
Journal reference
Quantum Information and Computation 9(5-6): 533 - 540, 1 May 2009
DOI
doi:10.26421/QIC9.5-6-12
Subjects
quant-phQuantum Physics

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    • Yes and no. Grover's algorithm is provably optimal [0]. No quantum algorithm will ever find an n-bit key by queries to any reasonable sort of oracle faster than Grover's algorithm, and Grover's algorithm is way too slow to be a serious problem. But symmetric ciphers are not…

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