Year: 2026
Type: preprint
Abstract: Quantum many-body dynamics is difficult to simulate because the global wavefunction develops extensive complexity, whereas local observables may retain only an intrinsic, system-size-independent complexity. This distinction is especially relevant in thermalizing systems, where local subsystems lose microscopic information and relax towards equilibrium. We introduce a variational time-evolution principle that exploits this separation by replacing global-state fidelity with a cost function defined on local reduced density matrices. The resulting locally optimized matrix-product-state (LOMPS) algorithm retains coherent short-time dynamics while using the simplification generated by thermalization at later times, and admits closed-form equations of motion analogous to the time-dependent variational principle. The same principle yields a quantum-classical algorithm in which a quantum processor evaluates the local cost and a noise-robust classical procedure performs the optimization. Proof-of-principle implementations on Quantinuum H2 and IBM Heron processors recover the characteristic local dynamics.
Source: arXiv (Cornell University)
Institutions: London Centre for Nanotechnology, University College London
Language: English
Topic: Quantum many-body systems
Subfield: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics
Field: Physics and Astronomy
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W7213607275