Alexander Poremba

I am a fifth year Ph.D. student in computer science at Caltech under the supervision of Thomas Vidick. I am affiliated with the Department of Computing and Mathematical Sciences and the Institute for Quantum Information and Matter. My research is supported by the Kortschak Scholars Fellowship and the ERP Fellowship by the German National Academic Foundation.

Contact: aporemba (at) caltech (dot) edu
Office: Annenberg, Room 236

Research

My research lies at the intersection of quantum computation and cryptography. I'm mainly interested in designing new applications for quantum computers, including near-term quantum algorithms and novel cryptographic protocols using lattice-based cryptography. Recently, I've been especially interested in how to obtain quantum advantage in cryptography. In other words, can we build practical quantum cryptographic primitives that are impossible to achieve in a classical world?

Curriculum Vitae

PhD, Computer Science, California Institute of Technology (2018 - present)
MSc, Physics, University of Heidelberg (2015 - 2017)
BSc, Mathematics, University of Heidelberg (2011 - 2015)

I was a long-term visitor at the Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing at the University of California, Berkeley, to attend the 2020 spring program The Quantum Wave in Computing. In the summer of 2018, I was awarded a Quantum Computing Summer Fellowship to work at Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico. Before I came to Caltech, I was also a long-term visitor at the University of Copenhagen, where I was fortunate to work with Gorjan Alagic at the Centre for the Mathematics of Quantum Theory.

A detailed academic CV is available upon request.

Publications

For a more up-to-date list, visit my Google Scholar page.

Improved Quantum Algorithms for Fidelity Estimation (2022)
András Gilyén and Alexander Poremba
Contributed talk at 17th Conference on the Theory of Quantum Computation, Communication and Cryptography (TQC) 2022.

Quantum Proofs of Deletion for Learning with Errors (2022)
Alexander Poremba
Proceedings of Innovations in Theoretical Computer Science (ITCS) 2023.
Short plenary talk at QIP 2022 and contributed talk at QCrypt 2022 and ASIACRYPT Quantum Cryptography Workshop (QCW) 2022.

Quantum Cryptography with Classical Communication:
Parallel Remote State Preparation for Copy-Protection, Verification, and more (2022)
Alexandru Gheorghiu, Tony Metger and Alexander Poremba
Contributed talk at 17th Conference on the Theory of Quantum Computation, Communication and Cryptography (TQC) 2022,
QCrypt 2022 and at ASIACRYPT Quantum Cryptography Workshop (QCW) 2022.

Quantum Copy-Protection of Compute-and-Compare Programs in the Quantum Random Oracle Model (2020)
Andrea Coladangelo, Christian Majenz and Alexander Poremba
Contributed talk at QIP 2021, Munich, Germany.

Variational Quantum Fidelity Estimation (2019)
Marco Cerezo, Alexander Poremba, Lukasz Cincio and Patrick J. Coles
Published in Quantum 4, 248 (2020).

On Quantum Chosen-Ciphertext Attacks and Learning with Errors (2018)
Gorjan Alagic, Stacey Jeffery, Maris Ozols and Alexander Poremba.
Published in Cryptography 4 (1), 10 (2020): Special Issue on Quantum Cryptography and Cyber Security.
Contributed talk at QCrypt 2018, Shanghai, China, and TQC 2019 at the University of Maryland, USA. [Talk]

Quantum-Assisted Quantum Compiling (2018)
Sumeet Khatri, Ryan LaRose, Alexander Poremba, Lukasz Cincio, Andrew T. Sornborger and Patrick J. Coles
Published in Quantum 3, 140 (2019).

Teaching Assistantships

- Caltech: CS 152: Introduction to Cryptography (Instructor: Prof. Thomas Vidick)
- Caltech: CS 101-3 Quantum Algorithms and Programming (Instructor: Dr. Alexandru Gheorgiu).
- Caltech: CS/PH 120 Quantum Cryptography (Instructor: Prof. Thomas Vidick).
- University of Heidelberg: Introduction to Computer Science (Instructor: Prof. Katja Mombaur)
- University of Heidelberg: Real Analysis II (Instructor: Prof. Hans Knüpfer)
- University of Heidelberg: Real Analysis I (Instructor: Prof. Winfried Kohnen)

Academic Services

Program committee: YQIS 2021
Reviewer: Quantum, Physical Review A, QIP, STOC, Eurocrypt, SODA, TQC, QCrypt, TCC, PQCRYPTO.