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Quantum computers have the potential to create important new opportunities for ongoing essential research on gauge theories. They can provide simulations that are unattainable on classical computers such as sign-problem afflicted models or time evolutions. In this work, we variationally prepare the low-lying eigenstates of a non-Abelian gauge theory with dynamically coupled matter on a quantum computer. This enables the observation of hadrons and the calculation of their associated masses. The SU(2) gauge group considered here represents an important first step towards ultimately studying quantum chromodynamics, the theory that describes the properties of protons, neutrons and other hadrons. Our calculations on an IBM superconducting platform utilize a variational quantum eigensolver to study both meson and baryon states, hadrons which have never been seen in a non-Abelian simulation on a quantum computer. We develop a hybrid resource-efficient approach by combining classical and quantum computing, that not only allows the study of an SU(2) gauge theory with dynamical matter fields on present-day quantum hardware, but further lays out the premises for future quantum simulations that will address currently unanswered questions in particle and nuclear physics. Quantum simulations of lattice gauge theories are in principle scalable, but their extension to dynamically coupled matter has proven difficult. In this work, the authors use a variational quantum eigensolver to simulate a non-Abelian LGT including the effects of both gauge fields and dynamical fermions.

A digital quantum simulation of a lattice gauge theory is performed on a quantum computer that consists of a few trapped-ion qubits; the model simulated is the Schwinger mechanism, which describes the creation of electron–positron pairs from vacuum. Four ions mimic particle physics Quantum simulations promise to provide solutions to problems where classical computational methods fail. An example of a challenging computational problem is the real-time dynamics in gauge theories — field theories paramount to modern particle physics. This paper presents a digital quantum simulation of a lattice gauge theory on a quantum computer consisting of a few qubits comprising trapped calcium controlled by electromagnetic fields. The specific model that the authors simulate is the Schwinger mechanism, which describes the creation of electron–positron pairs from vacuum. As an early example of a particle-physics theory simulated with an atomic physics experiment, this could potentially open the door to simulating more complicated and otherwise computationally intractable models. Gauge theories are fundamental to our understanding of interactions between the elementary constituents of matter as mediated by gauge bosons 1 , 2 . However, computing the real-time dynamics in gauge theories is a notorious challenge for classical computational methods. This has recently stimulated theoretical effort, using Feynman’s idea of a quantum simulator 3 , 4 , to devise schemes for simulating such theories on engineered quantum-mechanical devices, with the difficulty that gauge invariance and the associated local conservation laws (Gauss laws) need to be implemented 5 , 6 , 7 . Here we report the experimental demonstration of a digital quantum simulation of a lattice gauge theory, by realizing (1 + 1)-dimensional quantum electrodynamics (the Schwinger model 8 , 9 ) on a few-qubit trapped-ion quantum computer. We are interested in the real-time evolution of the Schwinger mechanism 10 , 11 , describing the instability of the bare vacuum due to quantum fluctuations, which manifests itself in the spontaneous creation of electron–positron pairs. To make efficient use of our quantum resources, we map the original problem to a spin model by eliminating the gauge fields 12 in favour of exotic long-range interactions, which can be directly and efficiently implemented on an ion trap architecture 13 . We explore the Schwinger mechanism of particle–antiparticle generation by monitoring the mass production and the vacuum persistence amplitude. Moreover, we track the real-time evolution of entanglement in the system, which illustrates how particle creation and entanglement generation are directly related. Our work represents a first step towards quantum simulation of high-energy theories using atomic physics experiments—the long-term intention is to extend this approach to real-time quantum simulations of non-Abelian lattice gauge theories.

Lattice gauge theories describe fundamental phenomena in nature, but calculating their real-time dynamics on classical computers is notoriously difficult. In a recent publication (Martinez et al 2016 Nature 534 516), we proposed and experimentally demonstrated a digital quantum simulation of the paradigmatic Schwinger model, a U(1)-Wilson lattice gauge theory describing the interplay between fermionic matter and gauge bosons. Here, we provide a detailed theoretical analysis of the performance and the potential of this protocol. Our strategy is based on analytically integrating out the gauge bosons, which preserves exact gauge invariance but results in complicated long-range interactions between the matter fields. Trapped-ion platforms are naturally suited to implementing these interactions, allowing for an efficient quantum simulation of the model, with a number of gate operations that scales polynomially with system size. Employing numerical simulations, we illustrate that relevant phenomena can be observed in larger experimental systems, using as an example the production of particle-antiparticle pairs after a quantum quench. We investigate theoretically the robustness of the scheme towards generic error sources, and show that near-future experiments can reach regimes where finite-size effects are insignificant. We also discuss the challenges in quantum simulating the continuum limit of the theory. Using our scheme, fundamental phenomena of lattice gauge theories can be probed using a broad set of experimentally accessible observables, including the entanglement entropy and the vacuum persistence amplitude.

The quantum chromodynamics (QCD) phase diagram, which reveals the state of strongly interacting matter at different temperatures and densities, is key to answering open questions in physics, ranging from the behaviour of particles in neutron stars to the conditions of the early universe. However, classical simulations of QCD face significant computational barriers, such as the sign problem at finite matter densities. Quantum computing offers a promising solution to overcome these challenges. Here, we take an important step toward exploring the QCD phase diagram with quantum devices by preparing thermal states in one-dimensional non-Abelian gauge theories. We experimentally simulate the thermal states of SU(2) and SU(3) gauge theories at finite densities on a trapped-ion quantum computer using a variational method. This is achieved by introducing two features: Firstly, we add motional ancillae to the existing qubit register to efficiently prepare thermal probability distributions. Secondly, we introduce charge-singlet measurements to enforce colour-neutrality constraints. This work pioneers the quantum simulation of QCD at finite density and temperature for two and three colours, laying the foundation to explore QCD phenomena on quantum platforms. Quantum simulations of the phase diagram of quantum chromodynamics faces hard challenges, such as having to prepare mixed states and enforcing the non-Abelian gauge symmetry constraints. Here, the authors show how to solve the two above problems in a trapped-ion device using motional ancillae and charge-singlet measurements.

Quantum-computing devices can be more powerful than their classical counterparts, but controlling large quantum systems is difficult. Two studies report work that overcomes this challenge. Quantum-computing devices can be more powerful than their classical counterparts, but controlling large quantum systems is difficult. Two studies report work that overcomes this challenge.

Quantum-computing devices can be more powerful than their classical counterparts, but controlling large quantum systems is difficult. Two studies report work that overcomes this challenge.

Gauge theories are fundamental to our understanding of interactions between the elementary constituents of matter as mediated by gauge bosons (1,2). However, computing the real-time dynamics in gauge theories is a notorious challenge for classical computational methods. This has recently stimulated theoretical effort, using Feynman's idea of a quantum simulator (3,4), to devise schemes for simulating such theories on engineered quantumme-chanical devices, with the difficulty that gauge invariance and the associated local conservation laws (Gauss laws) need to be implemented (5-7). Here we report the experimental demonstration of a digital quantum simulation of a lattice gauge theory, by realizing (1 + 1)-dimensional quantum electrodynamics (the Schwinger model (8,9)) on a few-qubit trapped-ion quantum computer. We are interested in the real-time evolution of the Schwinger mechanism (10,11), describing the instability of the bare vacuum due to quantum fluctuations, which manifests itself in the spontaneous creation of electron-positron pairs. To make efficient use of our quantum resources, we map the original problem to a spin model by eliminating the gauge fields (12) in favour of exotic long-range interactions, which can be directly and efficiently implemented on an ion trap architecture (13). We explore the Schwinger mechanism of particle-antiparticle generation by monitoring the mass production and the vacuum persistence amplitude. Moreover, we track the real-time evolution of entanglement in the system, which illustrates how particle creation and entanglement generation are directly related. Our work represents a first step towards quantum simulation of high-energy theories using atomic physics experiments--the long-term intention is to extend this approach to real-time quantum simulations of non-Abelian lattice gauge theories.

Quantum state tomography (QST) is the art of reconstructing an unknown quantum state through measurements. It is a key primitive for developing quantum technologies. Neural network quantum state tomography (NNQST), which aims to reconstruct the quantum state via a neural network ansatz, is often implemented via a basis-dependent cross-entropy loss function. State-of-the-art implementations of NNQST are often restricted to characterizing a particular subclass of states, to avoid an exponential growth in the number of required measurement settings. To provide a more broadly applicable method for efficient state reconstruction, we present \"neural-shadow quantum state tomography\" (NSQST)-an alternative neural network-based QST protocol that uses infidelity as the loss function. The infidelity is estimated using the classical shadows of the target state. Infidelity is a natural choice for training loss, benefiting from the proven measurement sample efficiency of the classical shadow formalism. Furthermore, NSQST is robust against various types of noise without any error mitigation. We numerically demonstrate the advantage of NSQST over NNQST at learning the relative phases of three target quantum states of practical interest, as well as the advantage over direct shadow estimation. NSQST greatly extends the practical reach of NNQST and provides a novel route to effective quantum state tomography.

Variational quantum eigensolvers (VQEs) are successful algorithms for studying physical systems on quantum computers. Recently, they were extended to the measurement-based model of quantum computing, bringing resource graph states and their advantages into the realm of quantum simulation. In this work, we incorporate such ideas into traditional VQE circuits. This enables novel problem-informed designs and versatile implementations of many-body Hamiltonians. We showcase our approach on real superconducting quantum computers by performing VQE simulations of testbed systems including the perturbed planar code, Z2 lattice gauge theory, 1D quantum chromodynamics, and the LiH molecule.

Quantum-enhanced computing methods are promising candidates to solve currently intractable problems. We consider here a variational quantum eigensolver (VQE), that delegates costly state preparations and measurements to quantum hardware, while classical optimization techniques guide the quantum hardware to create a desired target state. In this work, we propose a bosonic VQE using superconducting microwave cavities, overcoming the typical restriction of a small Hilbert space when the VQE is qubit based. The considered platform allows for strong nonlinearities between photon modes, which are highly customisable and can be tuned in situ, i.e. during running experiments. Our proposal hence allows for the realization of a wide range of bosonic ansatz states, and is therefore especially useful when simulating models involving degrees of freedom that cannot be simply mapped to qubits, such as gauge theories, that include components which require infinite-dimensional Hilbert spaces. We thus propose to experimentally apply this bosonic VQE to the U(1) Higgs model including a topological term, which in general introduces a sign problem in the model, making it intractable with conventional Monte Carlo methods.