Hybrid Parallel Ant Colony Optimization for Application to Quantum Computing to Solve Large-Scale Combinatorial Optimization Problems

Quantum computing is a promising technology that may provide breakthrough solutions to today’s difficult problems such as breaking encryption and solving large-scale combinatorial optimization problems. An algorithm referred to as Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA) has been recently proposed to approximately solve hard problems using a protocol know as bang–bang. The technique is based on unitary evolution using a Hamiltonian encoding of the objective function of the combinatorial optimization problem. The QAOA was explored in the context of several optimization problems such as the Max-Cut problem and the Traveling Salesman Problem (TSP). Due to the relatively small node-size solution capability of the available quantum computers and simulators, we developed a hybrid approach where sub-graphs of a TSP tour can be executed on a quantum computer, and the results from the quantum optimization are combined for a further optimization of the whole tour. Since the local optimization of a sub-graph is prone to becoming trapped in a local minimum, we overcame this problem by using a parallel Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) algorithm with periodic pheromone exchange between colonies. Our method exceeds existing approaches which have attempted partitioning a graph for small problems (less than 48 nodes) with sub-optimal results. We obtained optimum results for benchmarks with less than 150 nodes and results usually within 1% of the known optimal solution for benchmarks with around 2000 nodes.