Quantum Computer and quantum algorithm for travelling salesman problem

Abstract

Depending upon the extraordinary power of Quantum Computing Algorithms various branches like Quantum Cryptography, Quantum Information Technology, Quantum Teleportation have emerged [1-4]. It is thought that this power of Quantum Computing Algorithms can also be successfully applied to many combinatorial optimization problems. In this article, a class of combinatorial optimization problem is chosen as case study under Quantum Computing. These problems are widely believed to be unsolvable in polynomial time. Mostly it provides suboptimal solutions in finite time using best known classical algorithms. Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP) is one such problem to be studied here. A great deal of effort has already been devoted towards devising efficient algorithms that can solve the problem [5-18]. Moreover, the methods of finding solutions for the TSP with Artificial Neural Network and Genetic Algorithms [5-8] do not provide the exact solution to the problems for all the cases, excepting a few. A successful attempt has been made to have a deterministic solution for TSP by applying the power of Quantum Computing Algorithm. Keywords: Quantum Computing, Travelling Salesman Problem, Quantum algorithms.

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