Single quantum querying of a database

Abstract

We present a class of fast quantum algorithms, based on Bernstein and Vazirani's parity problem, that retrieve the entire contents of a quantum database $Y$ in a single query. The class includes binary search problems and coin-weighing problems. Our methods far exceed the efficiency of classical algorithms which are bounded by the classical information-theoretic bound. We show the connection between classical algorithms based on several compression codes and our quantum-mechanical method.