Oxford Journal of Student Scholarship
Hamiltonian Learning through Lie-Theoretic Methods
Evan Wael Salama Gadelkarem Salama
Abstract
This paper presents a method for identifying unknown coefficients of basis elements in an effective Hamiltonian of single-qubit cases.This is done directly from the measurement statistics of a quantum system's unitary evolution, utilizing a unique method of Lie algebra coefficient recovery.The method exploits the fact that repeated application of a unitary operator amplifies the generator coefficient linearly in the exponent.The result produces measurement probabilities that constrain the unknown coefficient differently at each power tested.Inversion of any single measurement probability yields a multivalued set of candidates due to the periodic nature of the trigonometric functions involved.However, the true coefficient can be identified as the unique true value satisfying a consistency criterion across all powers simultaneously.The method is demonstrated numerically for the single-generator Hamiltonian and extended analytically to the two-generator case where geometric (𝐻 𝑒 = 𝑎𝑋) (𝐻 𝑒 = 𝑎𝑋 + 𝑏𝑍), conjugation reduces the Hamiltonian to an effective single-generator form.Numerical simulations further verify the geometric reduction and the subsequent coefficient reconstruction for representative two-generator Hamiltonians, given a known rotation angle.In both cases, the correct coefficients are recovered from measurement statistics, without ancilla qubits, coherent control circuits, or prior knowledge of the system's spectrum; for the two-generator case, the rotation angle used to align the Hamiltonian is currently taken as given rather than estimated from data.