Search

In this paper, we propose a new distribution with unitary support which can be characterized as a ratio of the type $W=X_1/(X_1+X_2)$, where $(X_1, X_2)^\top$ follows a bivariate extreme distribution with Fr\'echet margins, that is, $X_1$ and $X_2$ are two correlated Fr\'echet random variables. Some mathematical properties such as identifiability, symmetry, stochastic representation, characterization as a ratio, moments, stress-strength probability, quantiles, and the maximum likelihood method are rigorously analyzed. Two applications of the ratio distribution are discussed., Comment: 24 pages, 10 figures

The certification of randomness is essential for both fundamental science and information technologies. Unlike traditional random number generators, randomness obtained from nonlocal correlations is fundamentally guaranteed to be unpredictable. However, it is also highly susceptible to noise. Here, we show that extending the conventional bipartite Bell scenario to hybrid quantum networks -- which incorporate both quantum channels and entanglement sources -- enhances the robustness of certifiable randomness. Our protocol even enables randomness to be certified from Bell-local states, broadening the range of quantum states useful for this task. Through both theoretical analysis and experimental validation in a photonic network, we demonstrate enhanced performance and improved noise resilience., Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures

Quantum memories are a crucial precondition in many protocols for processing quantum information. A fundamental problem that illustrates this statement is given by the task of channel discrimination, in which an unknown channel drawn from a known random ensemble should be determined by applying it for a single time. In this paper, we characterise the quality of channel discrimination protocols when the quantum memory, quantified by the auxiliary dimension, is limited. This is achieved by formulating the problem in terms of separable quantum states with additional affine constraints that all of their factors in each separable decomposition obey. We discuss the computation of upper and lower bounds to the solutions of such problems which allow for new insights into the role of memory in channel discrimination. In addition to the single-copy scenario, this methodological insight allows to systematically characterise quantum and classical memories in adaptive channel discrimination protocols. Especially, our methods enabled us to identify channel discrimination scenarios where classical or quantum memory is required, and to identify the hierarchical and non-hierarchical relationships within adaptive channel discrimination protocols., Comment: 32 pages, comments are welcome!

Many real-world complex systems are characterized by non-pairwise -- higher-order -- interactions among system's units, and can be effectively modeled as hypergraphs. Directed hypergraphs distinguish between source and target sets within each hyperedge, and allow to account for the directional flow of information between nodes. Here, we provide a framework to characterize the structural organization of directed higher-order networks at their microscale. First, we extract the fingerprint of a directed hypergraph, capturing the frequency of hyperedges with a certain source and target sizes, and use this information to compute differences in higher-order connectivity patterns among real-world systems. Then, we formulate reciprocity in hypergraphs, including exact, strong, and weak definitions, to measure to which extent hyperedges are reciprocated. Finally, we extend motif analysis to identify recurring interaction patterns and extract the building blocks of directed hypergraphs. We validate our framework on empirical datasets, including Bitcoin transactions, metabolic networks, and citation data, revealing structural principles behind the organization of real-world systems.

Distributed Asynchronous Object Store (DAOS) is a novel software-defined object store leveraging Non-Volatile Memory (NVM) devices, designed for high performance. It provides a number of interfaces for applications to undertake I/O, ranging from a native object storage API to a DAOS FUSE module for seamless compatibility with existing applications using POSIX file system APIs. In this paper we discuss these interfaces and the options they provide, exercise DAOS through them with various I/O benchmarks, and analyse the observed performance. We also briefly compare the performance with a distributed file system and another object storage system deployed on the same hardware, and showcase DAOS' potential and increased flexibility to support high-performance I/O., Comment: 9 pages, 38 figures, PDSW'24

Quantum theory is consistent with a computational model permitting black-box operations to be applied in an indefinite causal order, going beyond the standard circuit model of computation. The quantum switch -- the simplest such example -- has been shown to provide numerous information-processing advantages. Here, we prove that the action of the quantum switch on two $n$-qubit quantum channels cannot be simulated deterministically and exactly by any causally ordered quantum circuit that uses $M$ calls to one channel and one call to the other, if $M \leq \max(2, 2^n-1)$. This demonstrates an exponential separation in quantum query complexity of indefinite causal order compared to standard quantum circuits., Comment: 23 pages, 3 figures

Higher-order transformations that act on a certain number of input quantum channels in an indefinite causal order - such as the quantum switch - cannot be described by standard quantum circuits that use the same number of calls of the input quantum channels. However, the question remains whether they can be simulated, i.e., whether their action on their input channels can be deterministically reproduced, for all arbitrary inputs, by a quantum circuit that uses a larger number of calls of the input channels. Here, we prove that when only one extra call of each input channel is available, the quantum switch cannot be simulated by any quantum circuit. We demonstrate that this result is robust by showing that, even when probabilistic and approximate simulations are considered, higher-order transformations that are close to the quantum switch can be at best simulated with a probability strictly less than one. This result stands in stark contrast with the known fact that, when the quantum switch acts exclusively on unitary channels, its action can be simulated., Comment: 16 + 14 pages, 4 + 5 figures

This work considers a teleportation task for Alice and Bob in a scenario where Bob cannot perform corrections. In particular, we analyse the task of \textit{multicopy state teleportation}, where Alice has $k$ identical copies of an arbitrary unknown $d$-dimensional qudit state $\vert\psi\rangle$ to teleport a single copy of $\vert\psi\rangle$ to Bob using a maximally entangled two-qudit state shared between Alice and Bob without Bob's correction. Alice may perform a joint measurement on her half of the entangled state and the $k$ copies of $\vert\psi\rangle$. We prove that the maximal probability of success for teleporting the exact state $\vert\psi\rangle$ to Bob is $p(d,k)=\frac{k}{d(k-1+d)}$ and present an explicit protocol to attain this performance. Then, by utilising $k$ copies of an arbitrary target state $\vert\psi\rangle$, we show how the multicopy state teleportation protocol can be employed to enhance the success probability of storage and retrieval of quantum programs, which aims to universally retrieve the action of an arbitrary quantum channel that is stored in a state. Our proofs make use of group representation theory methods, which may find applications beyond the problems addressed in this work., Comment: 25 pages,3 figures. Comments are welcome

Given an $r$-colouring of the edges of a graph $G$, we say that it can be partitioned into $p$ monochromatic cycles when there exists a set of $p$ vertex-disjoint monochromatic cycles covering all the vertices of $G$. In the literature of this problem, an edge and a single vertex both count as a cycle. We show that for every $2$-colouring of the edges of a complete balanced bipartite graph, $K_{n,n}$, it can be partitioned into at most 4 monochromatic cycles. This type of question was first studied in 1970 for complete graphs and in 1983, by Gy\'arf\'as and Lehel, for $K_{n,n}$. In 2014, Pokrovskiy, has showed that any $2$-colouring of the edges of $K_{n,n}$ can be partitioned into at most $3$ paths. It turns out that finding monochromatic cycles instead of paths is a natural question that has also being asked for other graphs. In 2015, Schaudt and Stein have showed that at most 14 cycles are necessary., Comment: 17 pages, 21 figures

In this paper we propose a family of multivariate asymmetric distributions over an arbitrary subset of set of real numbers which is defined in terms of the well-known elliptically symmetric distributions. We explore essential properties, including the characterization of the density function for various distribution types, as well as other key aspects such as identifiability, quantiles, stochastic representation, conditional and marginal distributions, moments, Kullback-Leibler Divergence, and parameter estimation. A Monte Carlo simulation study is performed for examining the performance of the developed parameter estimation method. Finally, the proposed models are used to analyze socioeconomic data., Comment: 37 pages, 7 figures

Port-based teleportation is a variant of quantum teleportation, where the receiver can choose one of the ports in his part of the entangled state shared with the sender, but cannot apply other recovery operations. We show that the optimal fidelity of deterministic port-based teleportation (dPBT) using $N=n+1$ ports to teleport a $d$-dimensional state is equivalent to the optimal fidelity of $d$-dimensional unitary estimation using $n$ calls of the input unitary operation. From any given dPBT, we can explicitly construct the corresponding unitary estimation protocol achieving the same optimal fidelity, and vice versa. Using the obtained one-to-one correspondence between dPBT and unitary estimation, we derive the asymptotic optimal fidelity of port-based teleportation given by $F = 1-\Theta(d^4 N^{-2})$, which improves the previously known result given by $1-O(d^5 N^{-2}) \leq F \leq 1-\Omega(d^2 N^{-2})$. We also show that the optimal fidelity of unitary estimation for the case $n\leq d-1$ is $F = {n+1 \over d^2}$, and this fidelity is equal to the optimal fidelity of unitary inversion with $n\leq d-1$ calls of the input unitary operation even if we allow indefinite causal order among the calls., Comment: 7+22 pages, 1+1 figures

In this paper, we propose a new distribution over the unit interval which can be characterized as a ratio of the type $Z=Y/(X+Y)$ where $X$ and $Y$ are two correlated Birnbaum-Saunders random variables. The density of $Z$ may be unimodal or bimodal. Simple expressions for the cumulative distribution function, moment-generating function and moments are obtained. Moreover, the stress-strength probability between $X$ and $Y$ is calculated explicitly in the symmetric case, that is, when the respective scale parameters are equal. Two applications of the ratio distribution are discussed., Comment: 22 pages; 10 figures

We consider the problem of certifying measurement incompatibility in a prepare-and-measure (PM) scenario. We present different families of sets of qubit measurements which are incompatible, but cannot lead to any quantum over classical advantage in PM scenarios. Our examples are obtained via a general theorem which proves a set of qubit dichotomic measurements can have their incompatibility certified in a PM scenario if and only if their incompatibility can be certified in a bipartite Bell scenario where the parties share a maximally entangled state. Our framework naturally suggests a hierarchy of increasingly stronger notions of incompatibility, in which more power is given to the classical simulation by increasing its dimensionality. For qubits, we give an example of measurements whose incompatibility can be certified against trit simulations, which we show is the strongest possible notion for qubits in this framework., Comment: 5 pages plus appendix

The Influence Maximization (IM) problem is a well-known NP-hard combinatorial problem over graphs whose goal is to find the set of nodes in a network that spreads influence at most. Among the various methods for solving the IM problem, evolutionary algorithms (EAs) have been shown to be particularly effective. While the literature on the topic is particularly ample, only a few attempts have been made at solving the IM problem over higher-order networks, namely extensions of standard graphs that can capture interactions that involve more than two nodes. Hypergraphs are a valuable tool for modeling complex interaction networks in various domains; however, they require rethinking of several graph-based problems, including IM. In this work, we propose a multi-objective EA for the IM problem over hypergraphs that leverages smart initialization and hypergraph-aware mutation. While the existing methods rely on greedy or heuristic methods, to our best knowledge this is the first attempt at applying EAs to this problem. Our results over nine real-world datasets and three propagation models, compared with five baseline algorithms, reveal that our method achieves in most cases state-of-the-art results in terms of hypervolume and solution diversity.

Operational Numerical Weather Prediction (NWP) workflows are highly data-intensive. Data volumes have increased by many orders of magnitude over the last 40 years, and are expected to continue to do so, especially given the upcoming adoption of Machine Learning in forecast processes. Parallel POSIX-compliant file systems have been the dominant paradigm in data storage and exchange in HPC workflows for many years. This paper presents ECMWF's move beyond the POSIX paradigm, implementing a backend for their storage library to support DAOS -- a novel high-performance object store designed for massively distributed Non-Volatile Memory. This system is demonstrated to be able to outperform the highly mature and optimised POSIX backend when used under high load and contention, as per typical forecast workflow I/O patterns. This work constitutes a significant step forward, beyond the performance constraints imposed by POSIX semantics., Comment: 12 pages, 6 figures, accepted at The ACM Platform For Advanced Scientific Computing (PASC) Conference, 2024

Bell nonlocality is a fundamental phenomenon of quantum physics as well as an essential resource for various tasks in quantum information processing. It is known that for the observation of nonlocality the measurements on a quantum system have to be incompatible, but the question which incompatible measurements are useful, remained open. Here we prove that any set of incompatible measurements on qubits leads to a violation of a suitable Bell inequality in a multiparticle scenario, where all parties perform the same set of measurements. Since there exists incompatible measurements on qubits which do not lead to Bell nonlocality for two particles, our results demonstrate a fundamental difference between two-particle and multi-particle nonlocality, pointing at the superactivation of measurement incompatibility as a resource. In addition, our results imply that measurement incompatibility for qubits can always be certified in a device-independent manner.

A wide variety of complex systems are characterized by interactions of different types involving varying numbers of units. Multiplex hypergraphs serve as a tool to describe such structures, capturing distinct types of higher-order interactions among a collection of units. In this work, we introduce a comprehensive set of measures to describe structural connectivity patterns in multiplex hypergraphs, considering scales from node and hyperedge levels to the system's mesoscale. We validate our measures with three real-world datasets: scientific co-authorship in physics, movie collaborations, and high school interactions. This validation reveals new collaboration patterns, identifies trends within and across movie subfields, and provides insights into daily interaction dynamics. Our framework aims to offer a more nuanced characterization of real-world systems marked by both multiplex and higher-order interactions., Comment: Arxiv version. Published in Applied Network Science

The analysis of complex and time-evolving interactions like social dynamics represents a current challenge for the science of complex systems. Temporal networks stand as a suitable tool to schematise such systems, encoding all the appearing interactions between pairs of individuals in discrete time. Over the years, network science has developed many measures to analyse and compare temporal networks. Some of them imply a decomposition of the network into small pieces of interactions, i.e. only involving a few nodes for a short time range. Along this line, a possible way to decompose a network is to assume an egocentric perspective, i.e. to consider for each node the time evolution of its neighbourhood. This has been proposed by Longa et al. by defining the "egocentric temporal neighbourhood", which has proven a useful tool to characterise temporal networks relative to social interactions. However, this definition neglects group interactions (quite common in social domains) as they are always decomposed into pairwise connections.A more general framework that allows us to consider also larger interactions is represented by higher-order networks. Here, we generalise the description of social interactions by making use of hypergraphs, consequently, we generalise its decomposition into "hyper egocentric temporal neighbourhoods". This will allow us to analyse social interactions, to compare different datasets or different nodes inside a dataset, by taking into account the intrinsic complexity represented by higher-order interactions. Even if we limit the order of interactions to the second (triplets of nodes), our results reveal the importance of a higher-order representation. In fact, our analyses show second-order structures are responsible for the majority of the variability at all scales: between datasets, amongst nodes and over time., Comment: 10 pages, 6 figures, 1 table

Graph matching is a fundamental problem in pattern recognition, with many applications such as software analysis and computational biology. One well-known type of graph matching problem is graph isomorphism, which consists of deciding if two graphs are identical. Despite its usefulness, the properties that one may check using graph isomorphism are rather limited, since it only allows strict equality checks between two graphs. For example, it does not allow one to check complex structural properties such as if the target graph is an arbitrary length sequence followed by an arbitrary size loop. We propose a generalization of graph isomorphism that allows one to check such properties through a declarative specification. This specification is given in the form of a Regular Graph Pattern (ReGaP), a special type of graph, inspired by regular expressions, that may contain wildcard nodes that represent arbitrary structures such as variable-sized sequences or subgraphs. We propose a SAT-based algorithm for checking if a target graph matches a given ReGaP. We also propose a preprocessing technique for improving the performance of the algorithm and evaluate it through an extensive experimental evaluation on benchmarks from the CodeSearchNet dataset., Comment: Shorter version accepted for publication at AAAI 2024

The derivation of Birnbaum-Saunders (BS) fatigue-life distribution is based on the asymptotic normality of crack damages' partial sums. We address the situation when this fails and the crack damages possess heavy-tailed distribution. In this note, a general class of fatigue-life distributions of BS type is proposed., Comment: 7 pages

Bell nonlocality refers to correlations between two distant, entangled particles that challenge classical notions of local causality. Beyond its foundational significance, nonlocality is crucial for device-independent technologies like quantum key distribution and randomness generation. Nonlocality quickly deteriorates in the presence of noise, and restoring nonlocal correlations requires additional resources. These often come in the form of many instances of the input state and joint measurements, incurring a significant resource overhead. Here, we experimentally demonstrate that single copies of Bell-local states, incapable of violating any standard Bell inequality, can give rise to nonlocality after being embedded into a quantum network of multiple parties. We subject the initial entangled state to a quantum channel that broadcasts part of the state to two independent receivers and certify the nonlocality in the resulting network by violating a tailored Bell-like inequality. We obtain these results without making any assumptions about the prepared states, the quantum channel, or the validity of quantum theory. Our findings have fundamental implications for nonlocality and enable the practical use of nonlocal correlations in real-world applications, even in scenarios dominated by noise., Comment: 14 pages, 6 figures. Final version published in Nature Communications

Memory is the fundamental form of temporal complexity: when present but uncontrollable, it manifests as non-Markovian noise; conversely, if controllable, memory can be a powerful resource for information processing. Memory effects arise from/are transmitted via interactions between a system and its environment; as such, they can be either classical or quantum. From a practical standpoint, quantum processes with classical memory promise near-term applicability: they are more powerful than their memoryless counterpart, yet at the same time can be controlled over significant timeframes without being spoiled by decoherence. However, despite practical and foundational value, apart from simple two-time scenarios, the distinction between quantum and classical memory remains unexplored. Here, we analyse multi-time quantum processes with memory mechanisms that transmit only classical information forward in time. Complementing this analysis, we also study two related -- but simpler to characterise -- sets of processes that could also be considered to have classical memory from a structural perspective, and demonstrate that these lead to remarkably distinct phenomena in the multi-time setting. Subsequently, we systematically stratify the full hierarchy of memory effects in quantum mechanics, many levels of which collapse in the two-time setting, making our results genuinely multi-time phenomena., Comment: 12.5+4.5 pages, 4 figures, 73 references; close to published version

MIP*=RE implies that C_{qa} (the closure of the set of tensor product correlations) and C_{qc} (the set of commuting correlations) can be separated by a hyperplane (i.e., a Bell-like inequality) and that there are correlations produced by commuting measurements (a finite number of them and with a finite number of outcomes) on an infinite-dimensional quantum system which cannot be approximated by sequences of finite-dimensional tensor product correlations. We point out that there are four logically possible universes after this result. Each possibility is interesting because it reveals either limitations in accepted physical theories or opportunities to test crucial aspects of nature. We list some open problems that may help us to design a road map to learn in which of these universes we are., Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures

Data extraction algorithms on data hypercubes, or datacubes, are traditionally only capable of cutting boxes of data along the datacube axes. For many use cases however, this is not a sufficient approach and returns more data than users might actually need. This not only forces users to apply post-processing after extraction, but more importantly this consumes more I/O resources than is necessary. When considering very large datacubes from which users only want to extract small non-rectangular subsets, the box approach does not scale well. Indeed, with this traditional approach, I/O systems quickly reach capacity, trying to read and return unwanted data to users. In this paper, we propose a novel technique, based on computational geometry concepts, which instead carefully pre-selects the precise bytes of data which the user needs in order to then only read those from the datacube. As we discuss later on, this novel extraction method will considerably help scale access to large petabyte size data hypercubes in a variety of scientific fields., Comment: 10 pages, 13 figures