We propose and evaluate a quantum-inspired algorithm for solving Quadratic Unconstrained Binary Optimization (QUBO) problems, which are mathematically equivalent to finding ground states of Ising spin-glass Hamiltonians. The algorithm employs Matrix Product States (MPS) to compactly represent large superpositions of spin configurations and utilizes a discrete driving schedule to guide the MPS toward the ground state. At each step, a driver Hamiltonian -- incorporating a transverse magnetic field -- is combined with the problem Hamiltonian to enable spin flips and facilitate quantum tunneling. The MPS is updated using the standard Density Matrix Renormalization Group (DMRG) method, which iteratively minimizes the system's energy via multiple sweeps across the spin chain. Despite its heuristic nature, the algorithm reliably identifies global minima, not merely near-optimal solutions, across diverse QUBO instances. We first demonstrate its effectiveness on intermediate-level Sudoku puzzles from publicly available sources, involving over $200$ Ising spins with long-range couplings dictated by constraint satisfaction. We then apply the algorithm to MaxCut problems from the Biq Mac library, successfully solving instances with up to $251$ nodes and $3,265$ edges. We discuss the advantages of this quantum-inspired approach, including its scalability, generalizability, and suitability for industrial-scale QUBO applications.

Molecular docking is an important tool for structure-based drug design, accelerating the efficiency of drug development. Complex and dynamic binding processes between proteins and small molecules require searching and sampling over a wide spatial range. Traditional docking by searching for possible binding sites and conformations is computationally complex and results poorly under blind docking. Quantum-inspired algorithms combining quantum properties and annealing show great advantages in solving combinatorial optimization problems. Inspired by this, we achieve an improved in blind docking by using quantum-inspired combined with gradients learned by deep learning in the encoded molecular space. Numerical simulation shows that our method outperforms traditional docking algorithms and deep learning-based algorithms over 10\%. Compared to the current state-of-the-art deep learning-based docking algorithm DiffDock, the success rate of Top-1 (RMSD<2) achieves an improvement from 33\% to 35\% in our same setup. In particular, a 6\% improvement is realized in the high-precision region(RMSD<1) on molecules data unseen in DiffDock, which demonstrates the well-generalized of our method.

Quantum-inspired singular value decomposition (SVD) is a technique to perform SVD in logarithmic time with respect to the dimension of a matrix, given access to the matrix embedded in a segment-tree data structure. The speedup is possible through the efficient sampling of matrix elements according to their norms. Here, we apply it to extreme learning which is a machine learning framework that performs linear regression using random feature vectors generated through a random neural network. The extreme learning is suited for the application of quantum-inspired SVD in that it first requires transforming each data to a random feature during which we can construct the data structure with a logarithmic overhead with respect to the number of data. We implement the algorithm and observe that it works order-of-magnitude faster than the exact SVD when we use high-dimensional feature vectors. However, we also observe that, for random features generated by random neural networks, we can replace the norm-based sampling in the quantum-inspired algorithm with uniform sampling to obtain the same level of test accuracy due to the uniformity of the matrix in this case. The norm-based sampling becomes effective for more non-uniform matrices obtained by optimizing the feature mapping. It implies the non-uniformity of matrix elements is a key property of the quantum-inspired SVD. This work is a first step toward the practical application of the quantum-inspired algorithm.

Scientists have theorized about the potential of quantum computing -- that is, a new approach to computation that uses probabilities, rather than binary signals, to make calculations -- for decades. But in recent years, both private and public sector investment into developing quantum computers has grown significantly, with one report projecting investments of more than $800 million in 2021 alone. Quantum technology could revolutionize everything from genomic sequencing to transport route optimization, from code-breaking to new materials development. But while quantum computers exist in the lab, general-purpose quantum computers aren't yet available for commercial use. How can businesses respond to potential disruptions from this technology before it has actually emerged into the mainstream market?