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arXiv · 2607.02811

An approach for calculating astrophysical opacities on quantum computers

Shivesh Pathak·Alina Kononov·Andrew D. Baczewski
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Abstract

We propose a quantum algorithmic protocol for calculating astrophysical opacities. Our implementation uses first- and second-quantized representations of interacting electronic and photonic subsystems and Hamiltonian simulation via the interaction picture. Inferring opacity from momentum-resolved measurements of the photonic register yields a direct relationship between qubit count and spectral range/resolution. Logical resource estimates for the classically challenging problem of solar iron opacity are comparable to another high-energy-density physics problem (Rubin et al., PNAS 121(3) (2024)).

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Shivesh Pathak, Alina Kononov, Andrew D. Baczewski. 2026-07-02. An approach for calculating astrophysical opacities on quantum computers. https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.02811

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