cirq.SupportsDecompose

An object that can be decomposed into simpler operations.

cirq.SupportsDecompose(
    *args, **kwargs
)

All decomposition methods should ultimately terminate on basic 1-qubit and 2-qubit gates included by default in Cirq. If a custom decomposition is not specified, Cirq will decompose all operations to XPow/YPow/ZPow/CZPow/Measurement

  • Global phase gateset. However, the default decomposition in Cirq should be a last resort fallback and it is recommended for consumers of decomposition to either not depend upon a specific target gateset, or give an intercepting_decomposer to cirq.decompose that attempts to target a specific gate set.

For example, cirq.TOFFOLI has a _decompose_ method that returns a pair of Hadamard gates surrounding a cirq.CCZ. Although cirq.CCZ is not a 1-qubit or 2-qubit operation, it specifies its own _decompose_ method that only returns 1-qubit or 2-qubit operations. This means that iteratively decomposing cirq.TOFFOLI terminates in 1-qubit and 2-qubit operations, and so almost all decomposition-aware code will be able to handle cirq.TOFFOLI instances.

Callers are responsible for iteratively decomposing until they are given operations that they understand. The cirq.decompose method is a simple way to do this, because it has logic to recursively decompose until a given keep predicate is satisfied.

Code implementing _decompose_ MUST NOT create cycles, such as a gate A decomposes into a gate B which decomposes back into gate A. This will result in infinite loops when calling cirq.decompose.

It is permitted (though not recommended) for the chain of decompositions resulting from an operation to hit a dead end before reaching 1-qubit or 2-qubit operations. When this happens, cirq.decompose will raise a TypeError by default, but can be configured to ignore the issue or raise a caller-provided error.

Methods

_decompose_

View source

_decompose_() -> DecomposeResult