Quantum computing has advanced enough that solving basic inverse problems in exploration seismology may be beneficial to show proof-of-concept results. The problems solved should be simple enough to work with the current early state of quantum computing hardware, which would be comparable to problems solved in the early stages of classical computing. We introduce an iterative algorithm for solving PDE-constrained optimization problems on a quantum annealer. We then use this method to invert for subsurface P-wave velocity—using a hybrid of classical and quantum computing—in a simple seismic experiment.
