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arXiv:2408.08639 · Quantum Science and Technology

Solving the quantum many-body Hamiltonian learning problem with neural differential equations

Timothy Heightman, Edward Jiang, Antonio Acín

Published Sep 30, 2025• 6 citations
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Abstract

Abstract Understanding and characterising quantum many-body dynamics remains a significant challenge due to both the exponential complexity required to represent quantum many-body Hamiltonians, and the need to accurately track states in time under the action of such Hamiltonians. This inherent complexity limits our ability to characterise quantum many-body systems, highlighting the need for innovative approaches to unlock their full potential. To address this challenge, we propose a novel method to solve the Hamiltonian learning (HL) problem -inferring quantum dynamics from many-body state trajectories. Our approach has the unprecedented advantage of distilling and filtering an estimator Hamiltonian from a Neural ODE representation of state trajectories. By distilling Hamiltonian information from Neural ODE onto an ansatz Hamiltonian, our method is reliably convergent, experimentally friendly, and interpretable. In addition to this, we propose a new quantitative benchmark based on power laws, which can objectively compare the reliability and generalisation capabilities of any two HL algorithms. Finally, we benchmark our method against state-of-the-art HL algorithms with a 1D spin- 1 / 2 chain proof of concept, giving a stable solution for HL on a set of Hamiltonians previously unlearnable in the literature. Code for our method is available and open source.

DOI
10.1088/2058-9565/ae0d79

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Abstract Understanding and characterising quantum many-body dynamics remains a significant challenge due to both the exponential complexity required to represent quantum many-body Hamiltonians, and the need to accurately track states in time under the action of such Hamiltonians. This inherent complexity limits our ability to characterise quantum many-body systems, highlighting the need for innovative approaches to unlock their full potential. To address this challenge, we propose a novel method to solve the Hamiltonian learning (HL) problem -inferring quantum dynamics from many-body state trajectories. Our approach has the unprecedented advantage of distilling and filtering an estimator Hamiltonian from a Neural ODE representation of state trajectories. By distilling Hamiltonian information from Neural ODE onto an ansatz Hamiltonian, our method is reliably convergent, experimentally friendly, and interpretable. In addition to this, we propose a new quantitative benchmark based on power laws, which can objectively compare the reliability and generalisation capabilities of any two HL algorithms. Finally, we benchmark our method against state-of-the-art HL algorithms with a 1D spin- 1 / 2 chain proof of concept, giving a stable solution for HL on a set of Hamiltonians previously unlearnable in the literature. Code for our method is available and open source.
Inferring the dynamical generator of a many-body quantum system from measurement data is essential for the verification, calibration, and control of quantum processors. When the system is open, this task becomes considerably harder than in the purely unitary case, because coherent and dissipative mechanisms can produce similar measurement statistics and long-time data can be insensitive to coherent couplings. Here we tackle this so-called Lindbladian learning problem of open-system characterisation with maximum-likelihood on Pauli measurements at multiple experimentally friendly \emph{transient} times, exploiting the richer information content of transient dynamics. To navigate the resulting non-convex likelihood loss-landscape, we augment the physical model neural differential-equation term, which is progressively removed during training to distil an interpretable Lindbladian solution. Our method reliably learns open-system dynamics across neutral-atom (with 2D connectivity) and superconducting Hamiltonians, as well as the Heisenberg XYZ, and PXP models on a spin-1/2 chain. For the dissipative part, we show robustness over phase noise, thermal noise, and their combination. Our algorithm can robustly infer these dissipative systems over noise-to-signal ratios spanning four orders of magnitude, and system sizes up to N=6N=6N=6 qubits with fewer than 5×1055 \times 10^55×105 shots.
Part of the challenge for quantum many-body problems comes from the difficulty of representing large-scale quantum states, which in general requires an exponentially large number of parameters. Neural networks provide a powerful tool to represent quantum many-body states. An important open question is what characterizes the representational power of deep and shallow neural networks, which is of fundamental interest due to the popularity of deep learning methods. Here, we give a proof that, assuming a widely believed computational complexity conjecture, a deep neural network can efficiently represent most physical states, including the ground states of many-body Hamiltonians and states generated by quantum dynamics, while a shallow network representation with a restricted Boltzmann machine cannot efficiently represent some of those states.One of the challenges in studies of quantum many-body physics is finding an efficient way to record the large system wavefunctions. Here the authors present an analysis of the capabilities of recently-proposed neural network representations for storing physically accessible quantum states.
Abstract Part of the challenge for quantum many-body problems comes from the difficulty of representing large-scale quantum states, which in general requires an exponentially large number of parameters. Neural networks provide a powerful tool to represent quantum many-body states. An important open question is what characterizes the representational power of deep and shallow neural networks, which is of fundamental interest due to the popularity of deep learning methods. Here, we give a proof that, assuming a widely believed computational complexity conjecture, a deep neural network can efficiently represent most physical states, including the ground states of many-body Hamiltonians and states generated by quantum dynamics, while a shallow network representation with a restricted Boltzmann machine cannot efficiently represent some of those states.
Abstract The problem of reconstructing an unknown time-dependent Hamiltonian of a two-level quantum system from data on the system’s dynamics is considered. A method based on a neural network within the Neural ODE framework is proposed, in which the continuous evolution of the quantum state is modeled by integrating the Schrödinger equation with a parametric Hamiltonian model implemented by the network. As input data, measured time series of the expectation values of Pauli operators for a qubit are used. The network is trained by minimizing the difference between the experimentally observed and modeled trajectories of quantum observables. Using the example of simulating spin dynamics in a time-varying magnetic field, it is shown that the proposed approach enables high-accuracy reconstruction of the time-dependent Hamiltonian parameters without interrupting the quantum evolution. The results demonstrate that the Neural ODE model provides continuous tracking of the time parameter and reliable reconstruction of the system’s dynamics under conditions of limited data and noise.
Preparing quantum many-body states on classical or quantum devices is a very challenging task that requires accounting for exponentially large Hilbert spaces. Although this complexity can be managed with exponential ansätze (such as in the coupled-cluster method), these approaches are often tailored to specific systems, which limits their universality. Recent work has shown that the contracted Schrödinger equation enables the construction of universal, formally exact exponential ansätze for quantum many-body physics. However, while the ansatz is capable of resolving arbitrary quantum systems, it still requires a full calculation of its parameters whenever the underlying Hamiltonian changes, even slightly. Here, inspired by recent progress in operator learning, we develop a surrogate neural network solver that generates the exponential ansatz parameters using the Hamiltonian parameters as inputs, eliminating the need for repetitive computations. We illustrate the effectiveness of this approach by training neural networks of several quantum many-body systems, including the Fermi-Hubbard model.
Hamiltonian learning (HL), enabling precise estimation of system parameters and underlying dynamics, plays a critical role in characterizing quantum systems. However, conventional HL methods face challenges in noise robustness and resource efficiency, especially under limited measurements. In this work, we present Inverse Physics-Informed Neural Networks for Hamiltonian Learning (iPINN-HL), an approach that incorporates the Schrödinger equation as a soft constraint via a loss function penalty into the ML procedure. This formulation allows the model to integrate both observational data and known physical laws to infer Hamiltonian parameters with greater accuracy and resource efficiency. We benchmark iPINN-HL against a deep-neural-network-based quantum state tomography method [denoted as DNN-HL (Deep Neural Network for Hamiltonian Learning)] and demonstrate its effectiveness across several different scenarios, including one-dimensional spin chains, cross-resonance gate calibration, crosstalk identification, and real-time compensation to parameter drift. Our results show that iPINN-HL can approach the Heisenberg limit and exhibits robustness to noises, while outperforming DNN-HL in accuracy and resource efficiency. Therefore, iPINN-HL is a powerful and flexible framework for quantum system characterization for practical tasks.