An Empirical Analysis of Realistic Noise in Quantum Neural Networks for Medical Classifications of Tabular, Signal and Imaging Data

Quantum machine learning has gained significant momentum in recent years, particularly with the use of parameterized quantum circuits that exhibit a certain level of resilience to noise in current NISQ devices. However, the real-world applicability of QML remains an active field of research as transitioning from idealized simulations to real quantum hardware introduces challenges related to data size and noise. Our study empirically analyzes the performance of popular quantum neural networks in ideal, noise-free conditions, but also in the presence of realistic noise, which was modeled to mimic the noisy behavior of current IBM quantum devices. We carefully selected three medical classification tasks that cover common data modalities with varying numbers of features-from tabular cell data to signal sampling points and image pixels. Our findings statistically show that while complex parameterized circuits perform well in noise-free simulations, their performance significantly deteriorates with increasing qubit numbers under noisy conditions. Our study suggests that parameterized quantum circuits of moderate complexity are a favorable choice for future experiments on noisy quantum devices.