We show that the quantum dynamics of interacting and noninteracting quantum particles are fundamentally different in the context of solving a particular computational problem. Specifically, we consider the graph isomorphism problem, in which one wishes to determine whether two graphs are isomorphic (related to each other by a relabeling of the graph vertices), and focus on a class of graphs with particularly high symmetry called strongly regular graphs (SRGs). We study the Green’s functions that characterize the dynamical evolution single-particle and two-particle quantum walks on pairs of nonisomorphic SRGs and show that interacting particles can distinguish nonisomorphic graphs that noninteracting particles cannot. We obtain the following specific results. (1) We prove that quantum walks of two noninteracting particles, fermions or bosons, cannot distinguish certain pairs of nonisomorphic SRGs. (2) We demonstrate numerically that two interacting bosons are more powerful than single particles and two noninteracting particles, in that quantum walks of interacting bosons distinguish all nonisomorphic pairs of SRGs that we examined. By utilizing high-throughput computing to perform over 500 million direct comparisons between evolution operators, we checked all tabulated pairs of nonisomorphic SRGs, including graphs with up to 64 vertices. (3) By performing a short-time expansion of the evolution operator, we derive distinguishing operators that provide analytic insight into the power of the interacting two-particle quantum walk.

• Received 16 February 2010

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.81.052313