Grover Adaptive Search With Fewer Queries

In binary optimization problems, where the goal is to find the input $\boldsymbol {x}$ that minimizes a given objective function, Grover adaptive search (GAS) is a well-known quantum algorithm that provides quadratic speedup when compared with the brute-force approaches of classical computers. GAS calls a renowned quantum search algorithm, Grover search (GS), as a subroutine to search for inputs with function values less than the threshold value. If such an input is found, the threshold value is updated with the function value and the search targets are narrowed. To search efficiently for a solution, an appropriate number of queries must be selected to amplify the desired state of the GS in each step. This paper discusses this issue and proposes a new method for selecting the number of queries and provides proof that our method achieves quadratic speedup as well as the original GAS. Furthermore, the simulation results for 40-bit problems confirm that our method allows an optimal solution with 22% fewer queries than the standard method, thus offering the possibility of significantly reduced computation times for combinatorial optimization problems.