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arXiv:1011.3085

Universal limits of nonlinear measure redistribution processes and their applications

Razvan Teodorescu

Published Nov 13, 2010• 0 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Deriving the time evolution of a distribution of probability (or a probability density matrix) is a problem encountered frequently in a variety of situations: for physical time, it could be a kinetic reaction study, while identifying time with the number of computational steps gives a typical picture of algorithms routinely used in quantum impurity solvers, density functional theory, etc. Using a truncation scheme for the expansion of the exact quantity is necessary due to constraints of the numerical implementation. However, this leads in turn to serious complications such as the Fermion Sign Problem (essentially, density or weights will become negative). By integrating angular degrees of freedom and reducing the dynamics to the radial component, the time evolution is reformulated as a nonlinear integral transform of the distribution function. A canonical decomposition into orthogonal polynomials leads back to the original sign problem, but using a characteristic-function representation allows to extract the asymptotic behavior, and gives an exact large-time limit, for many initial conditions, with guaranteed positivity.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1011.3085

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Deriving the time evolution of a distribution of probability (or a probability density matrix) is a problem encountered frequently in a variety of situations: for physical time, it could be a kinetic reaction study, while identifying time with the number of computational steps gives a typical picture of algorithms routinely used in quantum impurity solvers, density functional theory, etc. Using a truncation scheme for the expansion of the exact quantity is necessary due to constraints of the numerical implementation. However, this leads in turn to serious complications such as the Fermion Sign Problem (essentially, density or weights will become negative). By integrating angular degrees of freedom and reducing the dynamics to the radial component, the time evolution is reformulated as a nonlinear integral transform of the distribution function. A canonical decomposition into orthogonal polynomials leads back to the original sign problem, but using a characteristic-function representation allows to extract the asymptotic behavior, and gives an exact large-time limit, for many initial conditions, with guaranteed positivity.
The positive P representation is a very successful tool in quantum optics. However, the usual assumption of negligible boundary terms in the time-evolution equations is not always valid. We explore the range of validity of the time-evolution equations both analytically and by numerical investigation of a number of specific examples. We present practical ways of verifying the validity of the use of the positive P representation and find that the standard time-evolution equation can become invalid when nonlinear terms (at unit photon number) are large relative to the damping rate. This is very much larger than is normally the case in nonlinear optics, except possibly near resonances. We are able to show that when the positive P representation is invalid, the boundary terms, normally neglected in an integration by parts, become non-negligible. When numerical simulations are carried out using the positive P representation, specific checks given in this paper should be carried out to verify the compactness of the distribution. In conclusion, we find that (apart from special cases) this technique of quantum time evolution is typically asymptotically valid in the limit of small nonlinearity, rather than exact.
Abstract: The quantum measurement problem has been the deepest conceptual difficulty since the birth of quantum mechanics. Standard quantum mechanics accepts wavefunction collapse as an independent postulate but never provides a physical explanation. The decoherence approach attributes collapse to the interaction between the system and its environment, but faces two fundamental limitations: the “infinite regress” problem and the “insufficiency of decoherence” problem. Within the framework of the Self-Construction Theory (SCT), this paper provides a complete resolution of the measurement problem. The core thesis is that quantum measurement is not a fundamental process independent of the laws of physical evolution, but rather a local manifestation of constructive renormalization—the scale evolution of the spacetime complex field KKK from microscopic degrees of freedom to macroscopic effective descriptions. The origins of wavefunction collapse, decoherence, and the Born rule receive a unified first‑principles interpretation in this framework. SCT’s spontaneous decoherence mechanism is the key to the resolution. Constructive renormalization inherently involves information loss—the integrated‑out microscopic degrees of freedom no longer exist in the macroscopic effective description. During a measurement, the measuring apparatus possesses a huge number (∼1023\sim10^{23}∼1023) of microscopic degrees of freedom. When the apparatus interacts with the measured system, constructive renormalization triggers information compression of these degrees of freedom—the apparatus can no longer distinguish which branch of the superposition it is in, and quantum coherence is thus spontaneously lost. No “external environment” is needed—the constructive renormalization dynamics of spacetime itself is the ultimate source of decoherence, thereby completely solving the “infinite regress” problem. Among the probability distribution given by the Born rule, the weights of non‑maximal probability branches are further suppressed by information compression under the huge number of microscopic degrees of freedom, so that macroscopic observers can perceive only a definite outcome in the effective description. The information loss caused by constructive renormalization is ontological—it does not rely on any approximation or truncation, thus fundamentally solving the “insufficiency of decoherence” problem. The Born rule—that measurement outcomes occur with probabilities given by the squared amplitudes—is directly derived from the constructive integral structure in SCT. In the constructive renormalization limit, interference terms between different configurations are naturally suppressed by off‑diagonal phase randomization, and the system automatically switches to a classical probabilistic description. In the diagonal density matrix representation, the squared amplitude is the only natural weight that is simultaneously real and non‑negative. Hence the Born rule is not an additional postulate of quantum mechanics but a necessary and unique manifestation of the relative frequencies of the constructive integral in the constructive renormalization limit. This derivation is rigorous within the mathematical framework of constructive renormalization—it does not rely on any approximations or truncations. SCT’s quantum measurement theory is deeply unified with the black hole information paradox. The “collapse” in quantum measurement and the “information loss” in black hole evaporation are different manifestations of the same core mechanism—the redistribution of information due to constructive renormalization—in two extreme physical situations. In quantum measurement, information is redistributed into the degrees of freedom of the macroscopic apparatus; in black hole evaporation, information is redistributed into the time‑point configurations on the horizon. This unification is the strongest proof of the universality of constructive renormalization as an information‑processing mechanism. Keywords: quantum measurement; spontaneous decoherence; constructive renormalization; Born rule; wavefunction collapse; information redistribution; Self-Construction Theory
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A numerical method is presented for reproducing fermionic quantum gas microscope experiments in equilibrium. By employing nested componentwise direct sampling of fermion pseudodensity matrices, as they arise naturally in determinantal quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) simulations, a stream of pseudosnapshots of occupation numbers on large systems can be produced. There is a sign problem even when the conventional determinantal QMC algorithm can be made sign-problem free, and every pseudosnapshot comes with a sign and a reweighting factor. Nonetheless, this ``sampling sign problem'' turns out to be weak and manageable in a large, relevant parameter regime. The method allows one to compute distribution functions of arbitrary quantities defined in occupation number space and, from a practical point of view, facilitates the computation of complicated conditional correlation functions. While the projective measurements in quantum gas microscope experiments achieve direct sampling of occupation number states from the density matrix, the presented numerical method requires a Markov chain as an intermediate step and thus achieves only indirect sampling, but the full distribution of pseudosnapshots after (signed) reweighting is identical to the distribution of snapshots from projective measurements.
Suzuki-Trotter decompositions of exponential operators like exp⁡(Ht)\exp(Ht)exp(Ht) are required in almost every branch of numerical physics. Often the exponent under consideration has to be split into more than two operators, for instance as local gates on quantum computers. In this work, we demonstrate how highly optimised schemes originally derived for exactly two operators can be applied to such generic Suzuki-Trotter decompositions. After this first trick, we explain what makes an efficient decomposition and how to choose from the large variety available. Furthermore we demonstrate that many problems for which a Suzuki-Trotter decomposition might appear to be the canonical ansatz, are better approached with different methods like Taylor or Chebyshev expansions. In particular, we derive an efficient and numerically stable method to implement truncated polynomial expansions based on a linear factorisation using their complex zeros.