Systems and methods for employing macroscopic resonant tunneling operations in quantum processors are described. New modes of use for quantum processor architectures employ probe qubits to determine energy eigenvalues of a problem Hamiltonian through macroscopic resonant tunneling operations. A dedicated probe qubit design that may be added to quantum processor architectures is also described. The dedicated probe qubit enables improved performance of macroscopic resonant tunneling operations and, consequently, improved performance of the new modes of use described.