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arXiv:2302.07897

Comment on "Traversable wormhole dynamics on a quantum processor"

Bryce Kobrin, Thomas Schuster, Norman Y. Yao

Published Feb 15, 2023• 4 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

A recent article [Nature 612, 51-55 (2022)] claims to observe traversable wormhole dynamics in an experiment. This claim is based upon performing a teleportation protocol using a Hamiltonian that consists of seven Majorana fermions with five fully-commuting terms. The Hamiltonian is generated via a machine-learning procedure designed to replicate the teleportation behavior of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model. The authors claim that the learned Hamiltonian reproduces gravitational dynamics of the SYK model and demonstrates gravitational teleportation through an emergent wormhole. We find: (i) in contrast to these claims, the learned Hamiltonian does not exhibit thermalization; (ii) the teleportation signal only resembles the SYK model for operators that were used in the machine-learning training; (iii) the observed perfect size winding is in fact a generic feature of small-size, fully-commuting models, and does not appear to persist in larger-size fully-commuting models or in non-commuting models at equivalent system sizes

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.2302.07897

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Comment on "Comment on "Traversable wormhole dynamics on a quantum processor" "

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We observe that the comment of [1, arXiv:2302.07897] is consistent with [2] on key points: i) the microscopic mechanism of the experimentally observed teleportation is size winding and ii) the system thermalizes and scrambles at the time of teleportation. These properties are consistent with a gravitational interpretation of the teleportation dynamics, as opposed to the late-time dynamics. The objections of [1] concern counterfactual scenarios outside of the experimentally implemented protocol.

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A recent article [Nature 612, 51-55 (2022)] claims to observe traversable wormhole dynamics in an experiment. This claim is based upon performing a teleportation protocol using a Hamiltonian that consists of seven Majorana fermions with five fully-commuting terms. The Hamiltonian is generated via a machine-learning procedure designed to replicate the teleportation behavior of the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev (SYK) model. The authors claim that the learned Hamiltonian reproduces gravitational dynamics of the SYK model and demonstrates gravitational teleportation through an emergent wormhole. We find: (i) in contrast to these claims, the learned Hamiltonian does not exhibit thermalization; (ii) the teleportation signal only resembles the SYK model for operators that were used in the machine-learning training; (iii) the observed perfect size winding is in fact a generic feature of small-size, fully-commuting models, and does not appear to persist in larger-size fully-commuting models or in non-commuting models at equivalent system sizes
The paper discusses Daniel Jafferis et al.'s "Nature" publication on "Traversable wormhole dynamics on a quantum processor." The experiment utilized Google's Sycamore quantum processor to simulate a sparse SYK model with a learned Hamiltonian. A debate ensued when Bryce Kobrin, Thomas Schuster, and Norman Yao raised concerns about the learned Hamiltonian's reliability, which Jafferis and the team addressed. Recently, there has been an update in the wormhole experiment saga. In an attempt to rescue the commuting Hamiltonian from its inevitable fate of being invalidated, a recent paper by Ping Gao proposed a creative solution to reinvigorate the concept within the context of teleportation through wormholes. This paper delves into the ongoing debate and the recent endeavor to address the comments made by Kobrin et al. I remain skeptical about the efforts to address Kobrin et al.'s challenges. By its nature, a commuting Hamiltonian does not exhibit chaotic behavior like non-commuting Hamiltonians. Moreover, it's always essential to assess the sensitivity of the Hamiltonian to noise to understand its practical feasibility for the real-world Sycamore processor.
We analyze the well-known Google–Caltech experiment in which the implementation of a traversable wormhole on a quantum computer was claimed. While the experiment constitutes a remarkable technological and conceptual achievement, we argue that, from a strict physical standpoint, what was realized is not a geometric wormhole in spacetime. Rather, the experiment implements a simplified effective Hamiltonian inspired by the Sachdev–Ye–Kitaev (SYK) model. This Hamiltonian was obtained through the training of artificial neural networks, yielding a tractable approximation suitable for execution on the quantum hardware of Google, in collaboration with California Institute of Technology. Within the framework of the gauge–gravity conjecture, this simplified SYK-like model admits a dual gravitational interpretation. In this dictionary, the observed quantum dynamics—specifically, quantum teleportation—can be reinterpreted as the traversability of a wormhole in an effective AdS_2 description. We emphasize three key points: first, the full SYK model is far too complex to be implemented directly, and the experiment relies on an AI-assisted effective Hamiltonian capturing only the relevant low-energy features; second, what is directly observed on the quantum computer is quantum teleportation; third, the notion of a traversable wormhole is not accessed directly as a gravitational spacetime geometry, but emerges only as a dual, interpretative description, with the gravitational theory being probed indirectly through quantum mechanics within the gauge–gravity correspondence.
A bstract In this work, we study a type of commuting SYK model in which all terms in the Hamiltonian are commutative to each other. Because of the commutativity, this model has a large number of conserved charges and is integrable. After the ensemble average of random couplings, we can solve this model exactly in any N . Though this integral model is not holographic, we do find that it has some holography-like features, especially the near-perfect size winding in high temperatures. Therefore, we would like to call it pseudo-holographic. We also find that the size winding of this model has a narrowly peaked size distribution, which is different from the ordinary SYK model. We apply the traversable wormhole teleportation protocol in the commuting SYK model and find that the teleportation has a few features similar to the semiclassical traversable wormhole but in different parameter regimes. We show that the underlying physics is not entirely determined by the size-winding mechanism but involves the peaked-size mechanism and thermalization. Lastly, we comment on the recent simulation of the dynamics of traversable wormholes on Google’s quantum processor.
In [1] we discussed how quantum gravity may be simulated using quantum devices and gave a specific proposal -- teleportation by size and the phenomenon of size-winding. Here we elaborate on what it means to do 'Quantum Gravity in the Lab' and how size-winding connects to bulk gravitational physics and traversable wormholes. Perfect size-winding is a remarkable, fine-grained property of the size wavefunction of an operator; we show from a bulk calculation that this property must hold for quantum systems with a nearly-AdS_2 bulk. We then examine in detail teleportation by size in three systems: the Sachdev-Ye-Kitaev model, random matrices, and spin chains, and discuss prospects for realizing these phenomena in near-term quantum devices.