Solving a Maze With a Quantum Computer

Mark A Bashuk

Published 2003-04-23Version 1

It is well known, and appreciated, that quantum computers have the potential to be the most powerful computational devices ever created. This newfound power comes from a quantum parallelism effect that allows the computer to be in multiple states at the same time. This property of quantum parallelism, while suited to handle common problems such as factoring and searching an unorganized database, is extremely well-suited to handle the task of solving a binary maze. I propose an algorithm that can be used to solve a binary maze on a quantum computer, with guaranteed accuracy. While it does work, it does come with a few setbacks, in that the maze must have no flaws, and that the computer requires a number of qubits equal to the number of decisions in the maze, plus log 2 of the decisions.