Advances in quantum simulation for nuclear physics

John W. Negele, Erich W. Vogt

Giacomo Marocco

Morten Hjorth-Jensen, Maria Paola Lombardo, U. van Kolck

Tianyin Li, Hongxi Xing, Dan-Bo Zhang

High-energy nuclear physics aims to explore and understand the physics of matter composed of quarks and gluons. However, it is intrinsically difficult to simulate high-energy nuclear physics from the first principle based quantum chromodynamics by using classical computers. In recent years, quantum computing has received intensive attention because it is expected to provide an ultimate solution for simulating high-energy nuclear physics. In this paper, we firstly review recent advances in quantum simulation of high-energy nuclear physics. Then we introduce some standard quantum algorithms, such as state preparation and measurements of light-cone correlation function. Finally, we demonstrate the advantage of quantum computing for solving the real-time evolution and the sign problems by studying hadronic scattering amplitude and phase structure of finite-temperature and finite-density matter, respectively.

Natalie Kloco

Dan-Bo Zhang, Hongxi Xing, Hui Yan +2 more

Nuclear physics, whose underling theory is described by quantum gauge field coupled with matter, is fundamentally important and yet is formidably challenge for simulation with classical computers. Quantum computing provides a perhaps transformative approach for studying and understanding nuclear physics. With rapid scaling-up of quantum processors as well as advances on quantum algorithms, the digital quantum simulation approach for simulating quantum gauge fields and nuclear physics has gained lots of attention. In this review, we aim to summarize recent efforts on solving nuclear physics with quantum computers. We first discuss a formulation of nuclear physics in the language of quantum computing. In particular, we review how quantum gauge fields (both Abelian and non-Abelian) and their coupling to matter field can be mapped and studied on a quantum computer. We then introduce related quantum algorithms for solving static properties and real-time evolution for quantum systems, and show their applications for a broad range of problems in nuclear physics, including simulation of lattice gauge field, solving nucleon and nuclear structures, quantum advantage for simulating scattering in quantum field theory, non-equilibrium dynamics, and so on. Finally, a short outlook on future work is given.