Yu-Ao Chen (陈俣翱)

Yu-Ao Chen (陈俣翱)

Tenure-Track Associate Professor

About Me

I am currently a tenure-track Associate Professor (准聘副教授) in the School of Software at Beihang University. My research focuses on quantum algorithms and quantum information theory, with additional interests in symbolic computation, representation theory, and cryptography.

Before joining Beihang, I was a Research Associate at QuAIR research group led by Prof. Xin Wang at the Thrust of Artificial Intelligence, Information Hub, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou), from 2023 to 2025. Prior to that, I was a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Quantum Computing, Baidu Inc..

I received my Ph.D. degree in Applied Mathematics from the Key Laboratory of Mathematics Mechanization, Academy of Mathematics and Systems Science(AMSS), Chinese Academy of Sciences in 2020, under the supervision of Prof. Xiao-Shan Gao. I obtained my B.S. in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics from the University of Science and Technology of China in 2015.

My Homepage in Chinese at Beihang can be found here. A full list of my publications can be found on Google Scholar or arXiv with author identifier chen_yu_18.

Interests

  • Quantum Algorithms
  • Quantum Information Theory
  • Symbolic Computation
  • Representation Theory
  • Cryptography

Education

  • Ph.D. in Applied Mathematics, 2020
    Academy of Mathematics and Systems Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences
  • B.S. in Mathematics and Applied Mathematics, 2015
    University of Science and Technology of China

Experience

  • Associate Professor, School of Software, Beihang University, Apr. 2026-present
  • Research Associate, AI Thurst, Information Hub, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (Guangzhou), Nov. 2023-Oct. 2025
  • Senior Researcher, the Institute for Quantum Computing, Baidu Inc., Jul. 2020-Jul. 2023

Selected Publications

  1. Power and limitations of distributed quantum state purification
    • Benchi Zhao, Yu-Ao Chen, Xuanqiang Zhao, Chengkai Zhu, Giulio Chiribella, Xin Wang
    • Physical Review Letters 136, 090203(2026)
    • arXiv:2509.08691
    • talk at TQC2026
    • We characterize LOCC-constrained quantum state purification under depolarizing noise, proving strong no-go results for universal two-copy purification while constructing explicit state-targeted protocols and an optimization framework for finite ensembles.
  2. Quantum Algorithm for Reversing Unknown Unitary Evolutions
    • Yu-Ao Chen, Yin Mo, Yingjian Liu, Lei Zhang, Xin Wang
    • arXiv:2403.04704
    • talks at TQC2025 and QCTiP2025, long talk at AQIS2025
    • We propose the Quantum Unitary Reversal Algorithm (QURA), which exactly reverses an arbitrary unknown unitary using O(d^2) queries, and analyze its role as a unitary inversion primitive with implications for quantum algorithm design and query complexity separation.
  3. Virtual Quantum Markov Chains
    • Yu-Ao Chen, Chengkai Zhu, Keming He, Mingrui Jing, and Xin Wang
    • IEEE Transactions on Information Theory 71(7), 5387-5399(2025)
    • arXiv:2312.02031
    • We introduce virtual quantum Markov chains as a measurement-statistics–based generalization of quantum Markov chains, providing an algebraic characterization of recoverability via local operations, distinguishing W- and GHZ-type entanglement, and defining a non-Markovianity measure quantifying recovery overhead.
  4. Physical Implementability for Reversible Magic State Manipulation
    • Yu-Ao Chen, Gilad Gour, Xin Wang, Lei Zhang, Chenghong Zhu
    • Communications Physics 8: 4(2025)
    • arXiv:2405.17356
    • We establish an exact reversible framework for magic-state manipulation in odd dimensions under trace-preserving and Wigner-positivity-preserving operations, showing that magic mana uniquely governs such reversible transformations and introducing physical implementability as a notion of operational cost.
  5. Quantum algorithm for Boolean equation solving and quantum algebraic attack on cryptosystems