On stability of k-local quantum phases of matter

TL;DR

This paper investigates the stability of quantum phases of matter when local interactions are generalized to graph-theoretic notions, showing conditions under which the energy gap remains stable against perturbations.

Contribution

It extends stability analysis of quantum phases to non-geometric local interactions, providing almost exponential improvements over traditional Euclidean models.

Findings

Energy gap stability under certain graph conditions

Almost exponential improvement over Euclidean locality models

Implications for thermodynamics and quantum error correction

Abstract

The current theoretical framework for topological phases of matter is based on the thermodynamic limit of a system with geometrically local interactions. A natural question is to what extent the notion of a phase of matter remains well-defined if we relax the constraint of geometric locality, and replace it with a weaker graph-theoretic notion of $k$-locality. As a step towards answering this question, we analyze the stability of the energy gap to perturbations for Hamiltonians corresponding to general quantum low-density parity-check codes, extending work of Bravyi and Hastings [Commun. Math. Phys. 307, 609 (2011)]. A corollary of our main result is that if there exist constants $\varepsilon_1,\varepsilon_2>0$ such that the size $\Gamma(r)$ of balls of radius $r$ on the interaction graph satisfy $\Gamma(r) = O(\exp(r^{1-\varepsilon_1}))$ and the local ground states of balls of radius $r\le\rho^\ast = O(\log(n)^{1+\varepsilon_2})$ are locally indistinguishable, then the energy gap of the associated Hamiltonian is stable against local perturbations. This gives an almost exponential improvement over the $D$-dimensional Euclidean case, which requires $\Gamma(r) = O(r^D)$ and $\rho^\ast = O(n^\alpha)$ for some $\alpha > 0$. The approach we follow falls just short of proving stability of finite-rate qLDPC codes, which have $\varepsilon_1 = 0$; we discuss some strategies to extend the result to these cases. We discuss implications for the third law of thermodynamics, as $k$-local Hamiltonians can have extensive zero-temperature entropy.