Partial Distinguishability as a Coherence Resource in Boson Sampling

Abstract

Quantum coherence is a useful resource that is consumed to accomplish several tasks that classical devices are hard to fulfill. Especially, it is considered to be the origin of quantum speedup for many computational algorithms. In this work, we interpret the computational time cost of boson sampling with partially distinguishable photons from the perspective of coherence resource theory. With incoherent operations that preserve the diagonal elements of quantum states up to permutation, which we name \emph{permuted genuinely incoherent operation} (pGIO), we present some evidence that the decrease of coherence corresponds to a computationally less complex system of partially distinguishable boson sampling. Our result shows that coherence is one of crucial resources for the computational time cost of boson sampling. We expect our work presents an insight to understand the quantum complexity of the linear optical network system.