Quantum subspace expansion approach for simulating dynamical response functions of Kitaev spin liquids

TL;DR

This paper presents a quantum simulation approach to study the dynamical properties of Kitaev spin liquids, enabling analysis of strongly correlated magnetic materials at larger scales.

Contribution

It introduces a quantum subspace expansion method combined with symmetry-guided ansatzes to simulate and measure properties of the Kitaev spin liquid beyond symmetric subspaces.

Findings

Successfully simulated the Kitaev spin liquid at finite magnetic fields.

Measured spin-spin correlation functions using quantum subspace expansion.

Simulated dynamical structure factors revealing quasiparticle properties.

Abstract

We develop a quantum simulation-based approach for studying properties of strongly correlated magnetic materials at increasing scale. We consider a paradigmatic example of a quantum spin liquid (QSL) state hosted by the honeycomb Kitaev model, and use a trainable symmetry-guided ansatz for preparing its ground state. Applying the tools of quantum subspace expansion (QSE), Hamiltonian operator approximation, and overlap measurements, we simulate the QSL at zero temperature and finite magnetic field, thus moving outside of the symmetric subspace. Next, we implement a protocol for quantum subspace expansion-based measurement of spin-spin correlation functions. Finally, we perform QSE-based simulation of the dynamical structure factor obtained from Green's functions of the finite field Kitaev model. Our results show that quantum simulators offer an insight to quasiparticle properties of strongly correlated magnets and can become a valuable tool for studying material science.