Developing techniques for Simulation of SU(3) Quantum Field Theories on State-of-the-Art Quantum Devices

TL;DR

This paper advances quantum simulation techniques for SU(3) quantum field theories and dense neutrino systems on NISQ devices, focusing on state preparation, time evolution, and hardware-efficient circuits to explore phenomena like hadron dynamics and neutrino interactions.

Contribution

It introduces NISQ-compatible quantum simulation methods for SU(3) lattice QCD and dense neutrino systems, including optimized circuits for near-term quantum hardware.

Findings

Comparison of VQE methods for SU(3) ground states

Design of Trotterized circuits for neutrino evolution

Identification of 'magic' states in neutrino systems

Abstract

Quantum computing has long been an experimental technology with the potential to simulate, at scale, phenomena which on classical devices would be too expensive to simulate at any but the smallest scales. Over the last several years, however, it has entered the NISQ era, where the number of qubits are sufficient for quantum advantage but substantial noise on hardware stands in the way of this achievement. This thesis details NISQ device-centered improvements to techniques of quantum simulation of the out-of-equilbrium real-time dynamics of lattice quantum chromodynamics (LQCD) and of dense 3-flavor neutrino systems on digital quantum devices. The first project concerning LQCD is a comparison of methods for implementing the variational quantum eigensolver (VQE) that initializes the ground state of an SU(3) plaquette-chain. The thesis then pivots to a 1+1D lattice of quarks interacting with an SU(3) gauge-field. A VQE-based state-preparation for the vacua and a Trotterized time-evolution circuit is designed and applied to the problems of simulating beta and neutrinoless double beta decay. Finally, these circuits are adapted to a version useable on quantum devices with nearest-neighbor connectivity with minimal overhead, with an eye towards utilizing the higher qubit count of such devices for hadron dynamics and scattering. This thesis covers two projects that concern dense 3-flavor neutrino systems. The first details design and testing of Trotterized time-evolution circuits on state-of-the-art quantum devices. The second, motivated by the Gottesman-Knill theorem's result that deviation from stabilizer states ("magic") is necessary for a problem to exhibit quantum advantage, details results with implications for the Standard Model in general that the 3 flavor ultradense neutrino systems with the highest, most-persistent magic are those that start with neutrinos in all 3 flavors.