Quantum Walks and Quantum Cellular Automata for Simulation of Unruh-DeWitt Detector

Mehendale, Shashank G. (2023) Quantum Walks and Quantum Cellular Automata for Simulation of Unruh-DeWitt Detector. Masters thesis, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Kolkata.

Text (Ms dissertation of Shashank G Mehendale (18MS074)) Thesis_18MS074.pdf - Submitted Version Restricted to Repository staff only Download (991kB)

Abstract

Quantum computing has kindled new hope in the scientific community for simulating complex physical processes occurring at the quantum scale. While a brute force classical algorithm can, of course, be written to simulate them on a classical computer, it will be of little use to scientists as it might scale exponentially with the size of the system and end up taking years of time to produce a meaningful result. But we expect an efficient quantum algorithm running on a quantum computer will reproduce the same results in just a polynomial time scale. One such field of physics that can greatly benefit from quantum computing is High Energy Physics. Due to the huge number of degrees of freedom involved in simulating a quantum field theory, quantum computing is expected to greatly outperform its classical counterpart. In this report, we explore the possibility of simulating one such quantum field theoretic phenomenon using quantum algorithms. Specifically, we develop a quantum cellular automata-based algorithm to simulate a discretized Unruh-DeWitt detector. In arriving at the algorithm, we also discuss the possibility of using quantum walks for field-theoretic simulations. We believe the current work contributes towards developing the field of quantum simulation of High Energy Physics and demonstrates the potential applications of using quantum cellular automata in quantum simulation protocols.

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