Tensors

Tensors can be described as multi-dimensional arrays, where the dimension is called the rank. A tensor of rank 0 is a scalar, a tensor of rank 1 is a vector and a tensor of rank 2 is a matrix, but in general tensors can have arbitrary rank. Visually, tensors are usually represented as circles with legs:

Note

Refer to the installation instructions for help with building the examples.

In Jet we can create these four different tensors easily in a simple C++ or Python program:

C++Python

#include <complex>

#include <Jet.hpp>

int main()
{
    using Tensor = Jet::Tensor<std::complex<float>>;

    Tensor A;                             // Scalar
    Tensor B({"i"}, {2});                 // Vector with index (i) and size 2
    Tensor C({"i", "j"}, {4, 3});         // Matrix with indices (i,j) and size 4x3
    Tensor D({"i", "j", "k"}, {3, 2, 4}); // Rank 3 tensor with indices (i,j,k) and size 3x2x4

    // Fill the tensors with random values
    A.FillRandom();
    B.FillRandom();
    C.FillRandom(7); // Seed RNG with value
    D.FillRandom(7); // Seed RNG with same value

    return 0;
};

For any given tensor, each leg corresponds to an index variable (\(i, j, k,\) etc). The power of the tensor representation comes from the intuitive way it expresses problems. Let us take a rank 2 tensor (i.e., a matrix) of size 2x2 as an example.

\[\begin{split}M_{i,j}=\begin{bmatrix} m_{0,0} & m_{0,1} \\ m_{1,0} & m_{1,1} \\ \end{bmatrix}\end{split}\]

Here, we can showcase the various constructors offered by the Tensor class, allowing you to choose whichever best suits your needs.

C++Python

// Create a tensor with single datum of complex<float>{0.0, 0.0}.
Tensor M0;

// Create a 3x2 tensor with automatically-labeled indices and zero-initialized data.
Tensor M1({3, 2});

// Create a 2x3x2 tensor with labeled indices (i,j,k) and zero-initialized data.
Tensor M2({"i", "j", "k"}, {2, 3, 2});

// Create a copy of the M2 tensor.
Tensor M3(M2);

// Create a 2x2 tensor with labeled indices (i,j) and data provided in row-major encoding.
Tensor M4({"i", "j"}, {2, 2}, {{0, 0}, {1, 0}, {0, 1}, {1, 1}});

Let us now generate a few familiar rank 2 tensors, the Pauli operators, using the Tensor class.

C++Python

std::vector<size_t> size{2, 2};
std::vector<std::string> indices{"i", "j"};

std::vector<std::complex<float>> pauli_x_data{{0, 0}, {1, 0}, {1, 0}, {0, 0}};
std::vector<std::complex<float>> pauli_y_data{{0, 0}, {0, -1}, {0, 1}, {0, 0}};
std::vector<std::complex<float>> pauli_z_data{{1, 0}, {0, 0}, {0, 0}, {-1, 0}};

Tensor X(indices, size, pauli_x_data);
Tensor Y(indices, size, pauli_y_data);
Tensor Z(indices, size, pauli_z_data);

The two indices \(i,j\), allow us to label the axes of the matrices. This notation easily allows operations like matrix-vector and matrix-matrix products to generalize for arbitrary dimensions. As an example, a matrix-vector product, described by notation:

\[\begin{split}L=\displaystyle\sum\limits_{j} M_{i,j} N_j =\begin{bmatrix} m_{0,0} & m_{0,1} \\ m_{1,0} & m_{1,1} \\ \end{bmatrix} \begin{bmatrix} n_0 \\ n_1 \end{bmatrix}= \begin{bmatrix} m_{0,0}n_0 + m_{0,1}n_1 \\ m_{1,0}n_0 + m_{1,1}n_1 \\ \end{bmatrix}\end{split}\]

can be expressed in graphical notation as:

The above demonstrates a unique property of tensors: by connecting legs with shared indices, we can perform Einstein summation over the shared indices. After this index contraction, the resulting tensor is formed with indices that did not participate in the operation. For the above example, over a shared index \(j\), the tensors \(M_{i,j}\) and \(N_j\) form a new rank 1 tensor, \(L_i\).

Taking our Pauli operators from earlier, we can use this tensor representation to describe operations on quantum states, just as one would with a quantum circuit. Expanding on the above, we now aim to calculate an expectation value of Pauli-Z operator, \(\langle 0 \vert \sigma_z \vert 0 \rangle\), defined as:

\[\begin{split}\langle 0 \vert \sigma_z \vert 0 \rangle=\begin{bmatrix} 1 & 0 \end{bmatrix}\begin{bmatrix} 1 & 0 \\ 0 & -1 \\ \end{bmatrix}\begin{bmatrix} 1 \\ 0 \end{bmatrix}\end{split}\]

which can be represented in graphical notation as:

Since we already know the result of this calculation (\(1.0\)), we can easily compare with Jet, as

C++Python

Tensor bra({"i"}, {2}, {{1, 0}, {0, 0}});
Tensor ket = bra; // Transposes are handled internally

Tensor op_ket = Z.ContractWithTensor(ket);
Tensor bra_op_ket = bra.ContractWithTensor(op_ket);

std::cout << "<0|sigma_z|0> = " << bra_op_ket.GetScalar() << std::endl;

which outputs

C++Python

<0|sigma_z|0> = (1,0)

as expected.

We can see that tensors, though useful individually, provide an incredibly powerful representation for performing calculations when combined together. We can next extend the above ideas to Tensor Networks.

use/tensors

 

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