Digital Simulation of Topological Matter on Programmable Quantum Processors

Feng Mei, Qihao Guo, Ya-Fei Yu, Liantuan Xiao, Shi-Liang Zhu, and Suotang Jia

Phys. Rev. Lett. 125, 160503 – Published 15 October 2020

Abstract

Simulating the topological phases of matter in synthetic quantum simulators is a topic of considerable interest. Given the universality of digital quantum simulators, the prospect of digitally simulating exotic topological phases is greatly enhanced. However, it is still an open question how to realize the digital quantum simulation of topological phases of matter. Here, using common single- and two-qubit elementary quantum gates, we propose and demonstrate an approach to design topologically protected quantum circuits on the current generation of noisy quantum processors where spin-orbital coupling and related topological matter can be digitally simulated. In particular, a low-depth topological quantum circuit is performed on both the IBM and Rigetti quantum processors. In the experiments, we not only observe but also distinguish the 0 and $π$ energy topological edge states by measuring the qubit excitation distribution at the output of the circuits.

Received 10 December 2019
Accepted 23 September 2020

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.125.160503

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Quantum algorithms Quantum gates Quantum information processing Quantum simulation Topological insulators Topological phases of matter

Superconducting qubits

Quantum Information, Science & TechnologyCondensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Feng Mei^1,2,*, Qihao Guo ³, Ya-Fei Yu⁴, Liantuan Xiao^1,2, Shi-Liang Zhu ^5,6,†, and Suotang Jia^1,2

¹State Key Laboratory of Quantum Optics and Quantum Optics Devices, Institute of Laser Spectroscopy, Shanxi University, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030006, China
²Collaborative Innovation Center of Extreme Optics, Shanxi University, Taiyuan, Shanxi 030006, China
³School of Science, Xian Jiaotong University, Xian 710049, Shaanxi, China
⁴Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Quantum Engineering and Quantum Materials, School of Information and Optoelectronic Science and Engineering, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510006, China
⁵National Laboratory of Solid State Microstructures, School of Physics, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, China
⁶Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Quantum Engineering and Quantum Materials, GPETR Center for Quantum Precision Measurement, Frontier Research Institute for Physics and SPTE, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510006, China

^*Corresponding author. meifeng@sxu.edu.cn
^†Corresponding author. slzhu@nju.edu.cn

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Issue

Vol. 125, Iss. 16 — 16 October 2020

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