TQFTs and quantum computing

Abstract

Quantum computing is captured in the formalism of the monoidal subcategory of VectC generated by C2 — in particular, quantum circuits are diagrams in VectC — while topological quantum field theories, in the sense of Atiyah, are diagrams in VectC indexed by cobordisms. We initiate a program to formalize this connection. In doing so, we equip cobordisms with machinery for producing linear maps by parallel transport along curves under a connection and then assemble these structures into a higher category. Finite-dimensional complex vector spaces and linear maps between them are given a suitable higher categorical structure which we call FVectC. We realize quantum circuits as images of cobordisms under monoidal functors from these modified cobordisms to FVectC, which are computed by taking parallel transports of vectors and then combining the results in a pattern encoded in the domain category.