Tensor network methods are taking a central role in modern quantum physics and beyond. They can provide an efficient approximation to certain classes of quantum states, and the associated graphical language makes it easy to describe and pictorially reason about quantum circuits, channels, protocols, open systems and more. Our goal is to explain tensor networks and some associated methods as quickly and as painlessly as possible. Beginning with the key definitions, the graphical tensor network language is presented through examples. We then provide an introduction to matrix product states. We conclude the tutorial with tensor contractions evaluating combinatorial counting problems. The first one counts the number of solutions for Boolean formulae, whereas the second is Penrose's tensor contraction algorithm, returning the number of $3$-edge-colorings of $3$-regular planar graphs.
Tensor network methods are taking a central role in modern quantum physics and beyond. They can provide an efficient approximation to certain classes of quantum states, and the associated graphical language makes it easy to describe and pictorially reason about quantum circuits, channels, protocols, open systems and more. Our goal is to explain tensor networks and some associated methods as quickly and as painlessly as possible. Beginning with the key definitions, the graphical tensor network language is presented through examples. We then provide an introduction to matrix product states. We conclude the tutorial with tensor contractions evaluating combinatorial counting problems. The first one counts the number of solutions for Boolean formulae, whereas the second is Penrose's tensor contraction algorithm, returning the number of 3-edge-colorings of 3-regular planar graphs.
These notes provide an introduction to tensor-network methods in quantum many-body physics, with an emphasis on matrix-product states (MPS). They develop the basic tensor-network language, including graphical notation, virtual indices, bond dimensions, gauge freedom, canonical forms, QR and singular-value decompositions, and the role of entanglement in controlling the efficiency of the representation. The main MPS algorithms are then introduced, including contractions, correlation functions, matrix-product operators, DMRG, and time-evolution methods. The notes also briefly discuss projected entangled-pair states (PEPS) as a higher-dimensional generalization of MPS, together with the basic ideas behind approximate PEPS contraction. Finally, tensor-network representations of mixed states, quantum channels, and Lindblad dynamics are presented, with applications to thermal states and open quantum systems. The presentation is accompanied by short Julia code examples based on ITensor, ITensorMPS, and TensorMixedStates. These notes were written for the 9th Les Houches Summer School on Computational Physics: Open Quantum Systems, held in June 2026.
High-dimensional data arise naturally in many areas of science and engineering, including machine learning, signal processing, computational physics, and statistics. Such data are often represented as tensors, multi-dimensional generalizations of matrices. While tensors provide a natural representation for multi-modal structure, their direct manipulation quickly becomes challenging as the order grows: the number of parameters increases exponentially, and algebraic expressions involving many indices become difficult to interpret and implement. Tensor networks (TNs) provide an effective framework for addressing these challenges. Originally introduced by Penrose and developed extensively in quantum physics, the graphical language of tensor networks encodes contractions as edges in a graph, reducing notational overhead and revealing structural properties obscured by index notation. Despite the central role of high-dimensional tensors in modern machine learning and numerical analysis, tensor network diagrams remain underutilized outside quantum computing, partly due to the lack of a self-contained mathematical reference accessible to a broad technical audience. This manuscript provides a self-contained guide to tensor networks and their use in tensor algebra. We present the main operations on tensors, contractions, products, and reshaping through, graphical notation, and show how classical tensor decompositions and related computations are naturally expressed in this framework. We also illustrate how tensor networks simplify the derivation of gradients and the manipulation of high-dimensional probability distributions. Throughout, we show that the diagrammatic approach yields genuinely shorter and more transparent proofs of classical identities, rank bounds, and gradient formulas that would otherwise require laborious index manipulation.
In this informal course, I intend to give an introduction to Tensor Networks and their use for numerical simulations.The class is targeted towards PhD students and researchers with no background on the subject. The goal is for the audience to be able to concretely use TNs in their research at the end of the course.The first session will start with a quick global introduction to tensor networks, and then focus on the one-dimensional Matrix Product States (Tensor Trains).We will go through their properties, strengths and limitations, and give a few explicit examples. We will then study a few concrete time-evolution and groundstate-search algorithms for finite and infinite systems.
Tensor network (TN), a young mathematical tool of high vitality and great potential, has been undergoing extremely rapid developments in the last two decades, gaining tremendous success in condensed matter physics, atomic physics, quantum information science, statistical physics, and so on. In this lecture notes, we focus on the contraction algorithms of TN as well as some of the applications to the simulations of quantum many-body systems. Starting from basic concepts and definitions, we first explain the relations between TN and physical problems, including the TN representations of classical partition functions, quantum many-body states (by matrix product state, tree TN, and projected entangled pair state), time evolution simulations, etc. These problems, which are challenging to solve, can be transformed to TN contraction problems. We present then several paradigm algorithms based on the ideas of the numerical renormalization group and/or boundary states, including density matrix renormalization group, time-evolving block decimation, coarse-graining/corner tensor renormalization group, and several distinguished variational algorithms. Finally, we revisit the TN approaches from the perspective of multi-linear algebra (also known as tensor algebra or tensor decompositions) and quantum simulation. Despite the apparent differences in the ideas and strategies of different TN algorithms, we aim at revealing the underlying relations and resemblances in order to present a systematic picture to understand the TN contraction approaches.
Tensor network contraction is central to problems ranging from many-body physics to computer science. We describe how to approximate tensor network contraction through bond compression on arbitrary graphs. In particular, we introduce a hyperoptimization over the compression and contraction strategy itself to minimize error and cost. We demonstrate that our protocol outperforms both handcrafted contraction strategies in the literature as well as recently proposed general contraction algorithms on a variety of synthetic and physical problems on regular lattices and random regular graphs. We further showcase the power of the approach by demonstrating approximate contraction of tensor networks for frustrated three-dimensional lattice partition functions, dimer counting on random regular graphs, and to access the hardness transition of random tensor network models, in graphs with many thousands of tensors. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
Situated as a language between computer science, quantum physics and mathematics, tensor network theory has steadily grown in popularity and can now be found in applications ranging across the entire field of quantum information processing. This book aims to present the best contemporary practices in the use of tensor networks as a reasoning tool, placing quantum states, operators and processes on the same compositional footing. The book has 7 parts and over 40 subsections which took shape in over a decade of teaching. In addition to covering the foundations, the book covers important applications such as matrix product states, open quantum systems and entanglement − all cast into the diagrammatic tensor network language. The intended audience includes those in quantum information science wishing to learn about tensor networks. It includes scientists who have employed tensor networks in their modeling codes who have interest in the tools graphical reasoning capacity. The audience further includes the graduate student researcher, whom with some effort, should find this book accessible. I would appreciate it if you emailed me about any mistakes or typos you find.