Skip to content

Batching simulations

Batching allows running many independent simulations concurrently. It can dramatically speedup simulations, especially on GPUs. In this tutorial, we explain how to batch quantum simulations in Dynamiqs.

import dynamiqs as dq
import jax.numpy as jnp
import timeit

Batching in short

Batching in Dynamiqs is achieved by passing a list of Hamiltonians, initial states, or jump operators to the simulation functions. The result of a batched simulation is a single array that contains all the individual simulations results. For example, let's simulate the Schrödinger equation for all combinations of the three Hamiltonians \(\{\sigma_x, \sigma_y, \sigma_z\}\) and the four initial states \(\{\ket{g}, \ket{e}, \ket{+}, \ket{-}\}\):

# define three Hamiltonians
H = [dq.sigmax(), dq.sigmay(), dq.sigmaz()]  # (3, 2, 2)

# define four initial states
g = dq.basis(2, 0)
e = dq.basis(2, 1)
plus = dq.unit(g + e)
minus = dq.unit(g - e)
psi = [g, e, plus, minus]  # (4, 2, 1)

# run the simulation
tsave = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 11)  # (11,)
result = dq.sesolve(H, psi, tsave)
print(f'Shape of result.states: {result.states.shape}')
Output
Shape of result.states: (3, 4, 11, 2, 1)

The returned states is an array with shape (3, 4, 11, 2, 1), where 3 is the number of Hamiltonians, 4 is the number of initial states, 11 is the number of saved states, and (2, 1) is the shape of a single state.

Note

All relevant result attributes are batched. For example if you specified exp_ops, the resulting expectation values result.expects will be an array with shape (3, 4, len(exp_ops), 11).

Importantly, batched simulations are not run sequentially in a for loop. What is meant by batching is that instead of evolving from initial to final time a single state with shape (2, 1) for each combination of argument, the whole batched state (3, 4, 2, 1) is evolved once from initial to final time, which is much more efficient.

Batching modes

There are two ways to batch simulations in Dynamiqs: cartesian batching and flat batching.

Cartesian batching

The simulation runs for all possible combinations of Hamiltonians, jump operators and initial states. This is the default mode.

For dq.sesolve, the returned array has shape: 

result.states.shape = (...H, ...psi0, ntsave, n, 1)
where ...x indicates the batching shape of x, i.e. its shape without the last two dimensions.

Example: Cartesian batching with dq.sesolve

  • H has shape (2, 3, n, n),
  • psi0 has shape (4, n, 1),

then result.states has shape (2, 3, 4, ntsave, n, 1).

For dq.mesolve, the returned array has shape: 

result.states.shape = (...H, ...L0, ...L1,  (...), ...rho0, ntsave, n, n)
where ...x indicates the batching shape of x, i.e. its shape without the last two dimensions.

Example: Cartesian batching with dq.mesolve

  • H has shape (2, 3, n, n),
  • jump_ops = [L0, L1] has shape [(4, 5, n, n), (6, n, n)],
  • rho0 has shape (7, n, n),

then result.states has shape (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, ntsave, n, n).

Flat batching

The simulation runs for each set of Hamiltonians, jump operators and initial states using broadcasting. This mode can be activated by setting cartesian_batching=False in dq.Options. In particular for dq.mesolve(), each jump operator can be batched independently from the others.

What is broadcasting?

JAX and NumPy broadcasting semantics are very powerful and allow you to write concise and efficient code. For more information, see the NumPy documentation on broadcasting.

For dq.sesolve, the returned array has shape: 

result.states.shape = (..., ntsave, n, 1)
where ... = jnp.broadcast_shapes(H, psi0) is the broadcasted shape of all arguments.

Example: Flat batching with dq.sesolve

  • H has shape (2, 3, n, n),
  • psi0 has shape (3, n, 1),

then result.states has shape (2, 3, ntsave, n, 1).

For dq.mesolve, the returned array has shape: 

result.states.shape = (..., ntsave, n, n)
where ... = jnp.broadcast_shapes(H, L0, L1, ..., rho0) is the broadcasted shape of all arguments.

Example: Flat batching with dq.mesolve

  • H has shape (2, 3, n, n),
  • jump_ops = [L0, L1] has shape [(3, n, n), (2, 1, n, n)],
  • rho0 has shape (3, n, n),

then result.states has shape (2, 3, ntsave, n, n).

Note

Any batch shape is valid as input as long as it is broadcastable with other arguments.

For example for dq.sesolve() with H of shape (2, 3, n, n), psi0 can be of shape: (n, 1), (3, n, 1), (2, 1, n, 1), (2, 3, n, 1), (..., 2, 3, n, 1), etc. By playing with the arguments shape, you have complete freedom over the simulation you want to run.

Creating batched arguments

Single-dimensional batching

There are multiple ways to create a batched argument.

The most straightforward way is to pass a list of values: 

# define several Hamiltonians
Hx, Hy, Hz = dq.sigmax(), dq.sigmay(), dq.sigmaz()
H = [Hx, Hy, Hz]  # (3, 2, 2)

It is often useful to sweep a parameter: 

# define several Hamiltonians
omega = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 21)
H = omega[:, None, None] * dq.sigmaz()  # (21, 2, 2)

Or you can use Dynamiqs utility functions directly: 

# define several initial states
alpha = [1.0, 2.0, 3.0]
psis = dq.coherent(16, alpha)  # (3, 16, 1)

Multi-dimensional batching

The previous examples illustrate batching over one dimension, but you can batch over as many dimensions as you want:

# define several Hamiltonians
H = [
    [Hx, 2 * Hx, 3 * Hx, 4 * Hx],
    [Hy, 2 * Hy, 3 * Hy, 4 * Hy],
    [Hz, 2 * Hz, 3 * Hz, 4 * Hz]
]  # (3, 4, 2, 2)

# define several Hamiltonians
omega = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 21)[:, None, None, None]
eps = jnp.linspace(0.0, 10.0, 11)[:, None, None]
H = omega * dq.sigmaz() + eps * dq.sigmaz()  # (21, 11, 2, 2)

# define several initial states
alpha_real = jnp.linspace(0, 1.0, 5)
alpha_imag = jnp.linspace(0, 1.0, 6)
alpha = alpha_real[:, None] + 1j * alpha_imag  # (5, 6)
psis = dq.coherent(16, alpha)  # (5, 6, 16, 1)

Batching over a TimeArray

We have seen how to batch over time-independent objects, but how about time-dependent ones? It's essentialy the same, you have to pass a batched TimeArray, in short:

The batching of the returned time-array is specified by values. For example, to define a PWC operator batched over a parameter \(\theta\): 

>>> thetas = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 11)  # (11,)
>>> times = [0.0, 1.0, 2.0]
>>> values = thetas[:, None] * jnp.array([3.0, -2.0])  # (11, 2)
>>> array = dq.sigmaz()
>>> H = dq.pwc(times, values, array)
>>> H.shape
(11, 2, 2)

The batching of the returned time-array is specified by the array returned by f. For example, to define a modulated Hamiltonian \(H(t)=\cos(\omega t)\sigma_x\) batched over the parameter \(\omega\): 

>>> omegas = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 11)  # (11,)
>>> f = lambda t: jnp.cos(omegas * t)
>>> H = dq.modulated(f, dq.sigmax())
>>> H.shape
(11, 2, 2)

The batching of the returned time-array is specified by the array returned by f. For example, to define an arbitrary time-dependent operator batched over a parameter \(\theta\): 

>>> thetas = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 11)  # (11,)
>>> f = lambda t: thetas[:, None, None] * jnp.array([[t, 0], [0, 1 - t]])
>>> H = dq.timecallable(f)
>>> H.shape
(11, 2, 2)

Why batching?

When batching multiple simulations, the state is not a 2-D array that evolves in time but a N-D array which holds all independent simulations. This allows running multiple simulations simultaneously with great efficiency, especially on GPUs. Moreover, it usually simplifies the simulation code and also the subsequent analysis of the results, because they are all gathered in a single large array.

Common use cases for batching include:

  • simulating a system with different values of a parameter (e.g. a drive amplitude),
  • simulating a system with different initial states (e.g. for gate tomography),
  • performing an optimisation using multiple starting points with random initial guesses (for parameters fitting or quantum optimal control).

Quick benchmark

To illustrate the performance gain of batching, let us compare the total run time between using a for loop vs using a batched simulation. We will simulate a set of 3,000 Hamiltonians on a two-level system:

# define 3000 Hamiltonians
omega = jnp.linspace(0.0, 10.0, 100)[:, None, None]
epsilon = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 30)[:, None, None, None]
H = omega * dq.sigmaz() + epsilon * dq.sigmax()  # (100, 30, 2, 2)

# other simulation parameters
psi0 = dq.basis(2, 0)
tsave = jnp.linspace(0.0, 1.0, 50)
options = dq.Options(progress_meter=None)

# running the simulations successively
def run_unbatched():
    results = []
    for i in range(len(omega)):
        for j in range(len(epsilon)):
            result = dq.sesolve(H[i, j], psi0, tsave, options=options)
            results.append(result)
    return results

# running the simulations simultaneously
def run_batched():
    return dq.sesolve(H, psi0, tsave, options=options)

# exclude JIT time from benchmarking by running each function once first
%timeit -n1 -r1 -q run_unbatched()
%timeit -n1 -r1 -q run_batched()

# time functions
%timeit run_unbatched()
%timeit run_batched()
Output
2.59 s ± 52.8 ms per loop (mean ± std. dev. of 7 runs, 1 loop each)
44.1 ms ± 2.66 ms per loop (mean ± std. dev. of 7 runs, 10 loops each)

As we can see, the batched simulation is much faster than the unbatched one. In this simple example, it is about 60 times faster. The gain in performance will be even more significant for larger simulations, or when using a GPU.