This release adds support for using Amazon Braket and Infeqtion's Superstaq as backends. Starting with this release, all C++ quantum kernels will be processed by the nvq++ compiler regardless of whether they run on a simulator or on a quantum hardware backend. This change is largely non-breaking, but language constructs that are not officially supported within quantum kernels will now lead to a compilation error whereas previously they could be used when executing on a simulator only. The previous behavior can be forced by passing the --library-mode flag to the compiler. Please note that if you do so, however, the code will never be executable outside of a simulator and may not be supported even on simulators.

What's Changed

Features and Enhancements 🎉

• Support for the braket target with Python frontend by @khalatepradnya in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2401
• Superstaq integration by @vtomole in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2423

Bug Fixes 🐛

• Fix uninitialized memory issue for the result buffer in statevector simulators by @1tnguyen in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2475
• Fixing JIT compilation error for cudaq.observe from Python by @schweitzpgi in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2392
• Fixing observe for single spin operator by @schweitzpgi in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2394
• Complete revision of pauli_word implementation by @schweitzpgi in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2338
• Fix NoiseModel for single-precision backends by @1tnguyen in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2406
• Fix a bug with C++ argument handling in the front end by @schweitzpgi in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2459

Breaking Changes 🛠

• Switch the default to enable mlir by @schweitzpgi in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2366

Documentation Updates ✏️

• Fix documentation for Python struct syntax by @bebora in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2365
• Document C++ API for get_state, sample and observe by @lmondada in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2140
• Documentation for braket target by @khalatepradnya in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2418
• Documentation for infleqtion target by @khalatepradnya in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2464
• Fix wrong parameters in docs for Fermioniq backend by @MarkusPfundstein in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2367

Other Changes

• Tensornet contraction path reuse for expectation value calculation by @1tnguyen in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2397
• Improve binary sizes by not globing MLIR dialects/passes by @boschmitt in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2414
• Improve performance of some opt passes by @annagrin in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2431
• Support measurements of subveqs for braket by @annagrin in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2416
• Support measurement sampling seed for cutensornet backends by @1tnguyen in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2398
• Support for allocatable quantum structs by @schweitzpgi in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2432
• Allow setting noise on measurement operation and apply it accordingly by @1tnguyen in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2447
• MGPU updates for NVLink and bug fixes by @1tnguyen in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2424

New Contributors

• @bebora made their first contribution in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2365
• @mitchdz made their first contribution in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2399
• @vtomole made their first contribution in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2423
• @lmondada made their first contribution in https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/pull/2140

Full Changelog: https://github.com/NVIDIA/cuda-quantum/compare/0.9.0...0.9.1. Release created by workflow 12315600791.