Optimal tradeoffs for estimating Pauli observables

Understand

We revisit the problem of Pauli shadow tomography: given copies of an unknown $n$-qubit quantum state $\rho$, estimate $\text{tr}(P\rho)$ for some set of Pauli operators $P$ to within additive error $\epsilon$.

• This has been a popular testbed for exploring the advantage of protocols with quantum memory over those without: with enough memory to measure two copies at a time, one can use Bell sampling to estimate $|\text{tr}(P\rho)|$ for all $P$ using $O(n/\epsilon^4)$ copies, but with $k\le n$ qubits of memory, $\Omega(2^{(n-k)/3})$ copies are needed.
• These results leave open several natural questions.
• How does this picture change in the physically relevant setting where one only needs to estimate a certain subset of Paulis? What is the optimal dependence on $\epsilon$? What is the optimal tradeoff between quantum memory and sample complexity? We answer all of these questions.