Variational quantum algorithms (VQAs) have attracted remarkable interest over the past few years because of their potential computational advantages on near-term quantum devices. They leverage a hybrid approach that integrates classical and quantum computing resources to solve high-dimensional problems that are challenging for classical approaches alone. In the training process of variational circuits, constructing an accurate probability distribution for each epoch is not always necessary, creating opportunities to reduce computational costs through shot reduction. However, existing shot allocation methods that capitalize on this potential often lack adaptive feedback or are tied to specific classical optimizers, which limits their applicability to common VQAs and broader optimization techniques. Our observations indicate that the information entropy of a quantum circuit’s output distribution exhibits an approximately exponential relationship with the number of shots needed to achieve a target Hellinger distance. In this work, we propose a distribution-adaptive dynamic shot (DDS) framework that efficiently adjusts the number of shots per iteration in VQAs using the entropy distribution from the prior training epoch. Our results demonstrate that the DDS framework sustains inference accuracy while achieving an ∼ 50 % reduction in average shot count compared to fixed-shot training, and ∼ 60 % higher accuracy than recently proposed tiered shot allocation methods. Furthermore, in noisy simulations that reflect the error rates of actual IBM quantum systems, DDS achieves an ∼ 30 % reduction in the total number of shots compared to the fixed-shot method with minimal degradation in accuracy and offers ∼ 70 % higher computational accuracy than tiered shot allocation methods.

A laser power bed fusion (L-PBF) manufacturing process was optimized by analyzing the surface morphology and track width w of single scan tracks (SSTs) on Fe-3.4wt.%Si. An SST was evaluated under process conditions of laser power P, scan speed V, and energy density E = P/V. The SST surface shape was mainly affected by E; desirable thin and regular tracks were obtained at E = 0.3 and 0.4 J/mm. An L-PBF process window was proposed considering the optimal w of SST, and the appropriate range of E for the alloy was identified to be 0.24 J/mm to 0.49 J/mm. w showed a strong relationship with E and V, and an analytic model was suggested. To verify the process window derived from the appropriate w of SST, cubic samples were manufactured with the estimated optimal process conditions. Most samples produced had a high density with a porosity of <1%, and the process window derived from SST w data had high reliability. This study presents a comprehensive approach to enhancing additive manufacturing for Fe-3.4Si alloy, offering valuable insights for achieving high-quality samples without the need for time-intensive procedures.

In this study, regression-based machine learning models were developed to predict the melt pool width and depth formed during the Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF) process for Fe-3.4Si and Fe-6Si alloys. Based on experimentally obtained melt pool width and depth data, a total of 11 regression models were trained and evaluated, and hyperparameters were optimized via Bayesian optimization. Key process parameters were identified through data preprocessing and feature engineering, and SHAP analysis confirmed that the input energy had the strongest influence on both melt pool width and depth. The comparison of prediction performance revealed that the support vector regressor with a linear kernel (SVR_lin) exhibited the best performance for predicting melt pool width, while the multilayer perceptron (MLP) model achieved the best results for predicting melt pool depth. Based on these trained models, a power–velocity (P-V) process map was constructed, incorporating boundary conditions such as the overlap ratio and the melt pool morphology. The optimal input energy range was derived as 0.45 to 0.60 J/mm, ensuring stable melt pool formation. Specimens manufactured under the derived conditions were analyzed using 3D X-ray CT, revealing porosity levels ranging from 0.29% to 2.89%. In particular, the lowest porosity was observed under conduction mode conditions when the melt pool depth was approximately 1.0 to 1.5 times the layer thickness. Conversely, porosity tended to increase in the transition mode and lack of fusion regions, consistent with the model predictions. Therefore, this study demonstrated that a machine learning-based regression model can reliably predict melt pool characteristics in the LPBF process of Fe-Si alloys, contributing to the development of process maps and optimization strategies.

Generative adversarial networks (GANs) are a machine learning technique capable of producing high-quality synthetic images. In the field of materials science, when a crystallographic dataset includes inadequate or difficult-to-obtain images, synthetic images can be used for image augmentation to mitigate data scarcity and streamline the preparation of datasets for high-throughput analysis. We integrate quantum computing with GANs into a hybrid quantum–classical GAN to generate complex 5-channel electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) images of two distinct microstructure phases of steel. By training a quantum circuit at the input layer of a large classical Wasserstein GAN (WGAN) model, we achieve higher image quality compared to a baseline classical GAN. The choice of WGAN also helps to mitigate mode collapse. We generate images from both ferrite and bainite microstructure phases in an end-to-end workflow. With respect to maximum mean discrepancy score, we find that the hybrid quantum–classical WGAN improves over classical Bernoulli GANs in 70% of samples. As the quantum computer is part of the training procedure, our method has potential to scale to larger number of qubits. Our results indicate that the WGAN model based on the quantum circuit ansatz may be effectively leveraged to enhance the quality of synthetic EBSD images on both quantum simulators and actual quantum hardware.