arXiv subjects

Bela Bauer

Publications and source records attributed to Bela Bauer.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2019

Emergent Fermi surface in a triangular-lattice SU(4) quantum antiferromagnet

Motivated by multiple possible physical realizations, we study the SU(4) quantum antiferromagnet with a fundamental representation on each site of the triangular lattice. We provide evidence for a gapless liquid ground state of this system with an emergent Fermi surface of fractionalized fermionic partons coupled with a U(1) gauge field. Our conclusions are based on numerical simulations using the density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method, which we support with a field theory analysis.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2019

Dephasing and leakage dynamics of noisy Majorana-based qubits: Topological versus Andreev

Topological quantum computation encodes quantum information nonlocally by nucleating non-Abelian anyons separated by distances $L$, typically spanning the qubit device size. This nonlocality renders topological qubits exponentially immune to dephasing from all sources of classical noise with operator support local on the scale of $L$. We perform detailed analytical and numerical analyses of a time-domain Ramsey-type protocol for noisy Majorana-based qubits that is designed to validate this coveted topological protection in near-term devices such as the so-called `tetron' design. By assessing dependence of dephasing times on tunable parameters, e.g., magnetic field, our proposed protocol can clearly distinguish a bona fide Majorana qubit from one constructed from semilocal Andreev bound states, which can otherwise closely mimic the true topological scenario in local probes. In addition, we analyze leakage of the qubit out of its low-energy manifold due to classical-noise-induced generation of quasiparticle excitations; leakage limits the qubit lifetime when the bulk gap collapses, and hence our protocol further reveals the onset of a topological phase transition. This experiment requires measurement of two nearby Majorana modes for both initialization and readout---achievable, for example, by tunnel coupling to a nearby quantum dot---but no further Majorana manipulations, and thus constitutes an enticing pre-braiding experiment. Along the way, we address conceptual subtleties encountered when discussing dephasing and leakage in the context of Majorana qubits.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Matrix product state algorithms for Gaussian fermionic states

While general quantum many-body systems require exponential resources to be simulated on a classical computer, systems of non-interacting fermions can be simulated exactly using polynomially scaling resources. Such systems may be of interest in their own right, but also occur as effective models in numerical methods for interacting systems, such as Hartree-Fock, density functional theory, and many others. Often it is desirable to solve systems of many thousand constituent particles, rendering these simulations computationally costly despite their polynomial scaling. We demonstrate how this scaling can be improved by adapting methods based on matrix product states, which have been enormously successful for low-dimensional interacting quantum systems, to the case of free fermions. Compared to the case of interacting systems, our methods achieve an exponential speedup in the entanglement entropy of the state. We demonstrate their use to solve systems of up to one million sites with an effective MPS bond dimension of 10^15.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2019

Spectral response of Josephson junctions with low-energy quasiparticles

We study nanowire-based Josephson junctions shunted by a capacitor and take into account the presence of low-energy quasiparticle excitations. These are treated by extending conventional models used to describe superconducting qubits to include the coherent coupling between fermionic quasiparticles, in particular the Majorana zero modes that emerge in topological superconductors, and the plasma mode of the junction. Using accurate, unbiased matrix-product state techniques, we compute the energy spectrum and response function of the system across the topological phase transition. Furthermore, we develop a perturbative approach, valid in the harmonic limit with small charging energy, illustrating how the presence of low-energy quasiparticles affects the spectrum and response of the junction. Our results are of direct interest to on-going experimental investigations of nanowire-based superconducting qubits.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Suppressing quasiparticle poisoning with a voltage-controlled filter

We study single-electron charging events in an Al/InAs nanowire hybrid system with deliberately introduced gapless regions. The occupancy of a Coulomb island is detected using a nearby radio-frequency quantum dot as a charge sensor. We demonstrate that a 1 micron gapped segment of the wire can be used to efficiently suppress single electron poisoning of the gapless region and therefore protect the parity of the island while maintaining good electrical contact with a normal lead. In the absence of protection by charging energy, the 1e switching rate can be reduced below 200 per second. In the same configuration, we observe strong quantum charge fluctuations due to exchange of electron pairs between the island and the lead. The magnetic field dependence of the poisoning rate yields a zero-field superconducting coherence length of ~ 90 nm.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Symmetry-protected non-Fermi liquids, Kagome spin liquids, and the chiral Kondo lattice model

The theoretical description of non-Fermi liquids is among the most challenging questions in strongly correlated quantum matter. While there are many experimental candidates for such phases, few examples can be studied using controlled theoretical approaches. Here we introduce a novel conceptual perspective to analytically describe the non-Fermi liquid physics of gapless spin liquids arising in a family of two- and three-dimensional Kagome models. We first discuss a symmetry-protection mechanism that is responsible for the stability of the gapless phase. We then re-cast the two-dimensional Kagome spin model as a chiral Kondo lattice model that can be tackled analytically using what is in a sense a generalization of coupled-wire constructions. We provide extensive numerical evidence for a gapless spin liquid in the two-dimensional Kagome model and discuss generalizations to three dimensions.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2018

Topologically protected braiding in a single wire using Floquet Majorana modes

Majorana zero modes are a promising platform for topologically protected quantum information processing. Their non-Abelian nature, which is key for performing quantum gates, is most prominently exhibited through braiding. While originally formulated for two-dimensional (2d) systems, it has been shown that braiding can also be realized using one-dimensional (1d) wires by forming an essentially two-dimensional network. Here, we show that in driven systems far from equilibrium, one can do away with the second spatial dimension altogether by instead using quasienergy as the second dimension. To realize this, we use a Floquet topological superconductor which can exhibit Majorana modes at two special eigenvalues of the evolution operator, 0 and pi, and thus can realize four Majorana modes in a single, driven quantum wire. We describe and numerically evaluate a protocol that realizes a topologically protected exchange of two Majorana zero modes in a single wire by adiabatically modulating the Floquet drive and using the pi modes as auxiliary degrees of freedom.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2018

Signatures of gapless fermionic spinons on a strip of the kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet

The search for exotic quantum spin liquid states in simple yet realistic spin models remains a central challenge in the field of frustrated quantum magnetism. Here we consider the canonical nearest-neighbor kagome Heisenberg antiferromagnet restricted to a quasi-1D strip consisting entirely of corner-sharing triangles. Using large-scale density matrix renormalization group calculations, we identify in this model an extended gapless quantum phase characterized by central charge $c=2$ and power-law decaying spin and bond-energy correlations which oscillate at tunably incommensurate wave vectors. We argue that this intriguing spin liquid phase can be understood as a marginal instability of a two-band spinon Fermi surface coupled to an emergent U(1) gauge field, an interpretation which we substantiate via bosonization analysis and Monte Carlo calculations on model Gutzwiller variational wave functions. Our results represent one of the first numerical demonstrations of emergent fermionic spinons in a simple SU(2) invariant nearest-neighbor Heisenberg model beyond the strictly 1D (Bethe chain) limit.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2018

Neural-network states for the classical simulation of quantum computing

Simulating quantum algorithms with classical resources generally requires exponential resources. However, heuristic classical approaches are often very efficient in approximately simulating special circuit structures, for example with limited entanglement, or based on one-dimensional geometries. Here we introduce a classical approach to the simulation of general quantum circuits based on neural-network quantum states (NQS) representations. Considering a set of universal quantum gates, we derive rules for exactly applying single-qubit and two-qubit Z rotations to NQS, whereas we provide a learning scheme to approximate the action of Hadamard gates. Results are shown for the Hadamard and Fourier transform of entangled initial states for systems sizes and total circuit depths exceeding what can be currently simulated with state-of-the-art brute-force techniques. The overall accuracy obtained by the neural-network states based on Restricted Boltzmann machines is satisfactory, and offers a classical route to simulating highly-entangled circuits. In the test cases considered, we find that our classical simulations are comparable to quantum simulations affected by an incoherent noise level in the hardware of about $10^{-3}$ per gate.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2018

Effects of gate-induced electric fields on semiconductor Majorana nanowires

We study the effect of gate-induced electric fields on the properties of semiconductor-superconductor hybrid nanowires which represent a promising platform for realizing topological superconductivity and Majorana zero modes. Using a self-consistent Schrödinger-Poisson approach that describes the semiconductor and the superconductor on equal footing, we are able to access the strong tunneling regime and identify the impact of an applied gate voltage on the coupling between semiconductor and superconductor. We discuss how physical parameters such as the induced superconducting gap and Landé g-factor in the semiconductor are modified by redistributing the density of states across the interface upon application of an external gate voltage. Finally, we map out the topological phase diagram as a function of magnetic field and gate voltage for InAs/Al nanowires.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2018

Dynamics of Majorana-based qubits operated with an array of tunable gates

We study the dynamics of Majorana zero modes that are shuttled via local tuning of the electrochemical potential in a superconducting wire. By performing time-dependent simulations of microscopic lattice models, we show that diabatic corrections associated with the moving Majorana modes are quantitatively captured by a simple Landau-Zener description. We further simulate a Rabi-oscillation protocol in a specific qubit design with four Majorana zero modes in a single wire and quantify constraints on the timescales for performing qubit operations in this setup. Our simulations utilize a Majorana representation of the system, which greatly simplifies simulations of superconductors at the mean-field level.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Extracting entanglement geometry from quantum states

Tensor networks impose a notion of geometry on the entanglement of a quantum system. In some cases, this geometry is found to reproduce key properties of holographic dualities, and subsequently much work has focused on using tensor networks as tractable models for holographic dualities. Conventionally, the structure of the network - and hence the geometry - is largely fixed a priori by the choice of tensor network ansatz. Here, we evade this restriction and describe an unbiased approach that allows us to extract the appropriate geometry from a given quantum state. We develop an algorithm that iteratively finds a unitary circuit that transforms a given quantum state into an unentangled product state. We then analyze the structure of the resulting unitary circuits. In the case of non-interacting, critical systems in one dimension, we recover signatures of scale invariance in the unitary network, and we show that appropriately defined geodesic paths between physical degrees of freedom exhibit known properties of a hyperbolic geometry.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2017

Pre-thermal phases of matter protected by time-translation symmetry

In a periodically driven (Floquet) system, there is the possibility for new phases of matter, not present in stationary systems, protected by discrete time-translation symmetry. This includes topological phases protected in part by time-translation symmetry, as well as phases distinguished by the spontaneous breaking of this symmetry, dubbed "Floquet time crystals". We show that such phases of matter can exist in the pre-thermal regime of periodically-driven systems, which exists generically for sufficiently large drive frequency, thereby eliminating the need for integrability or strong quenched disorder that limited previous constructions. We prove a theorem that states that such a pre-thermal regime persists until times that are nearly exponentially-long in the ratio of certain couplings to the drive frequency. By similar techniques, we can also construct stationary systems which spontaneously break *continuous* time-translation symmetry. We argue furthermore that for driven systems coupled to a cold bath, the pre-thermal regime could potentially persist to infinite time.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2016

Hybrid quantum-classical approach to correlated materials

Recent improvements in control of quantum systems make it seem feasible to finally build a quantum computer within a decade. While it has been shown that such a quantum computer can in principle solve certain small electronic structure problems and idealized model Hamiltonians, the highly relevant problem of directly solving a complex correlated material appears to require a prohibitive amount of resources. Here, we show that by using a hybrid quantum-classical algorithm that incorporates the power of a small quantum computer into a framework of classical embedding algorithms, the electronic structure of complex correlated materials can be efficiently tackled using a quantum computer. In our approach, the quantum computer solves a small effective quantum impurity problem that is self-consistently determined via a feedback loop between the quantum and classical computation. Use of a quantum computer enables much larger and more accurate simulations than with any known classical algorithm, and will allow many open questions in quantum materials to be resolved once a small quantum computer with around one hundred logical qubits becomes available.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2016

Ising Anyons in Frustration-Free Majorana-Dimer Models

Dimer models have long been a fruitful playground for understanding topological physics. Here we introduce a new class - termed Majorana-dimer models - wherein bosonic dimers are decorated with pairs of Majorana modes. We find that the simplest examples of such systems realize an intriguing, intrinsically fermionic phase of matter that can be viewed as the product of a chiral Ising theory, which hosts deconfined non-Abelian quasiparticles, and a topological $p_x - ip_y$ superconductor. While the bulk anyons are described by a single copy of the Ising theory, the edge remains fully gapped. Consequently, this phase can arise in exactly solvable, frustration-free models. We describe two parent Hamiltonians: one generalizes the well-known dimer model on the triangular lattice, while the other is most naturally understood as a model of decorated fluctuating loops on a honeycomb lattice. Using modular transformations, we show that the ground-state manifold of the latter model unambiguously exhibits all properties of the $\text{Ising} \times (p_x-ip_y)$ theory. We also discuss generalizations with more than one Majorana mode per site, which realize phases related to Kitaev's 16-fold way in a similar fashion.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2016

Floquet Time Crystals

We define what it means for time translation symmetry to be spontaneously broken in a quantum system, and show with analytical arguments and numerical simulations that this occurs in a large class of many-body-localized driven systems with discrete time-translation symmetry.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2016

Optimizing spin-orbit splittings in InSb Majorana nanowires

Semiconductor-superconductor heterostructures represent a promising platform for the detection of Majorana zero modes and subsequently the processing of quantum information using their exotic non-Abelian statistics. Theoretical modeling of such low-dimensional semiconductors is generally based on phenomenological effective models. However, a more microscopic understanding of their band structure and, especially, of the spin-orbit coupling of electrons in these devices is important for optimizing their parameters for applications in quantum computing. In this paper, we approach this problem by first obtaining a highly accurate effective tight-binding model from ab initio calculations in the bulk. This model is symmetrized and correctly reproduces both the band structure and the wavefunction character. It is then used to determine Dresselhaus and Rashba spin-orbit splittings induced by finite size effects and external electric field in zincblende InSb one- and two-dimensional nanostructures as a function of growth parameters. The method presented here enables reliable simulations of realistic devices, including those used to realize exotic topological states.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2016

Many-body localization in the presence of a small bath

In the presence of strong disorder and weak interactions, closed quantum systems can enter a many-body localized phase where the system does not conduct, does not equilibrate even for arbitrarily long times, and robustly violates quantum statistical mechanics. The starting point for such a many-body localized phase is usually taken to be an Anderson insulator where, in the limit of vanishing interactions, all degrees of freedom of the system are localized. Here, we instead consider a model where in the non-interacting limit, some degrees of freedom are localized while others remain delocalized. Such a system can be viewed as a model for a many-body localized system brought into contact with a small bath of a comparable number of degrees of freedom. We numerically and analytically study the effect of interactions on this system and find that generically, the entire system delocalizes. However, we find certain parameter regimes where results are consistent with localization of the entire system, an effect recently termed many-body proximity effect.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗