Photonic Time-Delayed Quantum Extreme Learning Machine

Abstract

We propose and numerically simulate a photonic quantum extreme learning machine (QELM) based on non-linear interactions in a time-delay non-linear interferometer with photon-number-resolving detection. We theoretically demonstrate the reservoir's computational capability by binary classification of the non-linear two moons benchmark. Analysis of the learned output weights and alternative quantum readouts shows that compact feature sets based on photon-number correlations preserve classification accuracy while potentially reducing measurement complexity. We further show that the QELM maintains its classification performance under the effect of losses by naturally redistributing the learned weights across a larger set of available features. These results demonstrate the resilience of the time-delay photonic implementation and highlight its potential as an experimentally accessible QELM platform.