The Dirac equation as a quantum walk: higher dimensions, observational convergence
The Dirac equation as a quantum walk: higher dimensions, observational convergence
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DOI:
10.1088/1751-8113/47/46/465302
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发表时间:
2014-11-21
影响因子:
2.1
通讯作者:
Forets, Marcelo
中科院分区:
文献类型:
--
作者:
Arrighi, Pablo;Nesme, Vincent;Forets, Marcelo
The Dirac equation can be modelled as a quantum walk (QW), whose main features are being: discrete in time and space (i.e. a unitary evolution of the wave-function of a particle on a lattice); homogeneous (i.e. translation-invariant and time-independent) and causal (i.e. information propagates at a bounded speed, in a strict sense). This link, which was proposed already by Succi and Benzi, Bialynicki-Birula and Meyer, is shown to hold for Bargmann-Wigner equations and symmetric hyperbolic systems in general. We then analytically prove the convergence of the solution of the QW to the solution of the Cauchy problem for the Dirac equation. We do so by adapting a powerful method from standard numerical analysis, which is of general interest to the field of quantum simulation. At the practical level, this result provides precise error bounds and convergence rates, thereby validating the QW as a quantum simulation scheme. At the theoretical level, it reinforces the status of this QW as a simple, discrete toy model of relativistic particles.