Qiss

Simulating indefinite causal order with Rindler observers

Realization of indefinite causal order (ICO), a theoretical possibility that even causal relations between physical events can be subjected to quantum superposition, apart from its general significance for the fundamental physics research, would also enable quantum information processing that outperforms protocols in which the underlying causal structure is definite. In this paper, we start with a proposition that an observer in a state of quantum superposition of being at two different relative distances from the event horizon of a black hole, effectively resides in ICO space-time generated by the black hole. By invoking the fact that the near-horizon geometry of a Schwarzschild black hole is that of a Rindler space-time, we propose a way to simulate an observer in ICO space-time by a Rindler observer in a state of superposition of having two different proper accelerations. By extension, a pair of Rindler observers with entangled proper accelerations simulates a pair of entangled ICO observers. Moreover, these Rindler-systems might have a plausible experimental realization by means of optomechanical resonators.

Discretizing parametrized systems: the magic of Ditt-invariance

Peculiar phenomena appear in the discretization of a system invariant under reparametrization. The structure of the continuum limit is markedly different from the usual one, as in lattice QCD. First, the continuum limit does not require tuning a parameter in the action to a critical value. Rather, there is a regime where the system approaches a sort of asymptotic topological invariance (“Ditt-invariance”). Second, in this regime the expansion in the number of discretization points provides a good approximation to the transition amplitudes. These phenomena are relevant for understanding the continuum limit of quantum gravity. I illustrate them here in the context of a simple system.

Discretizing parametrized systems: the magic of Ditt-invariance

Peculiar phenomena appear in the discretization of a system invariant under reparametrization. The structure of the continuum limit is markedly different from the usual one, as in lattice QCD. First, the continuum limit does not require tuning a parameter in the action to a critical value. Rather, there is a regime where the system approaches a sort of asymptotic topological invariance (“Ditt-invariance”). Second, in this regime the expansion in the number of discretization points provides a good approximation to the transition amplitudes. These phenomena are relevant for understanding the continuum limit of quantum gravity. I illustrate them here in the context of a simple system.

Refining embeddings with fill-tuning: data-efficient generalised performance improvements for materials foundation models

Pretrained foundation models learn embeddings that can be used for a wide range of downstream tasks. These embeddings optimise general performance, and if insufficiently accurate at a specific task the model can be fine-tuned to improve performance. For all current methodologies this operation necessarily degrades performance on all out-of-distribution tasks. In this work we present ‘fill-tuning’, a novel methodology to generate datasets for continued pretraining of foundation models that are not suited to a particular downstream task, but instead aim to correct poor regions of the embedding. We present the application of roughness analysis to latent space topologies and illustrate how it can be used to propose data that will be most valuable to improving the embedding. We apply fill-tuning to a set of state-of-the-art materials foundation models trained on $O(10^9)$ data points and show model improvement of almost 1% in all downstream tasks with the addition of only 100 data points. This method provides a route to the general improvement of foundation models at the computational cost of fine-tuning.

Geometry from quantum temporal correlations

In this work, we show how Euclidean 3-space uniquely emerges from the structure of quantum temporal correlations associated with sequential measurements of Pauli observables on a single qubit. Quite remarkably, the quantum temporal correlations which give rise to geometry are independent of the initial state of the qubit, which we show enables an observer to extract geometric data from sequential measurements without the observer having any knowledge of initial conditions. Such results suggest the plausibility that space itself may emerge from quantum temporal correlations, and we formulate a toy model of such a hypothetical phenomenon.

Average mutual information for random fermionic Gaussian quantum states

Studying the typical entanglement entropy of a bipartite system when averaging over different ensembles of pure quantum states has been instrumental in different areas of physics, ranging from many-body quantum chaos to black hole evaporation. We extend such analysis to open quantum systems and mixed states, where we compute the typical mutual information in a bipartite system averaged over the ensemble of mixed Gaussian states with a fixed spectrum. Tools from random matrix theory and determinantal point processes allow us to compute arbitrary k-point correlation functions of the singular values of the corresponding complex structure in a subsystem for a given spectrum in the full system. In particular, we evaluate the average von Neumann entropy in a subsystem based on the level density and the average mutual information. Those results are given for finite system size as well as in the thermodynamic limit.

Taming Thiemann’s Hamiltonian constraint in canonical loop quantum gravity: reversibility, eigenstates and graph-change analysis

The Hamiltonian constraint remains an elusive object in loop quantum gravity because its action on spinnetworks leads to changes in their corresponding graphs. As a result, calculations in loop quantum gravity are often considered unpractical, and neither the eigenstates of the Hamiltonian constraint, which form the physical space of states, nor the concrete effect of its graph-changing character on observables are entirely known. Much worse, there is no reference value to judge whether the commonly adopted graph-preserving approximations lead to results anywhere close to the non-approximated dynamics. Our work sheds light on many of these issues, by devising a new numerical tool that allows us to implement the action of the Hamiltonian constraint without the need for approximations and to calculate expectation values for geometric observables. To achieve that, we fill the theoretical gap left in the derivations of the action of the Hamiltonian constraint on spinnetworks: we provide the first complete derivation of such action for the case of 4-valent spinnetworks, while updating the corresponding derivation for 3-valent spinnetworks. Our derivations also include the action of the volume operator. By proposing a new approach to encode spinnetworks into functions of lists and the derived formulas into functionals, we implement both the Hamiltonian constraint and the volume operator numerically. We are able to transform spinnetworks with graph-changing dynamics perturbatively and verify that volume expectation values have rather different behavior from the approximated, graph-preserving results. Furthermore, using our tool we find a family of potentially relevant solutions of the Hamiltonian constraint. Our work paves the way to a new generation of calculations in loop quantum gravity, in which graph-changing results and their phenomenology can finally be accounted for and understood.

Computing the graph-changing dynamics of loop quantum gravity

In loop quantum gravity (LQG), quantum states of the gravitational field are represented by labelled graphs called spinnetworks. Their dynamics can be described by a Hamiltonian constraint, which modifies the spinnetwork graphs. Fixed graph approximations of the dynamics have been extensively studied, but its full graph-changing action so far remains elusive. The latter, alongside the solutions of its constraint, are arguably the missing features to access physically correct quantum-relativistic phenomenology from canonical LQG. Here, we introduce the first numerical tool that implements graph-changing dynamics via the Hamiltonian constraint. We find new solutions to this constraint and show that some quantum-geometrical observables behave differently than in the graph-preserving truncation. This work aims at fostering a new era of numerical simulations in canonical LQG that, crucially, embrace the graph-changing aspects of its dynamics, laying aside debated approximations.

Dissipation-induced Quantum Homogenization for Temporal Information Processing

Quantum reservoirs have great potential as they utilize the complex real-time dissipative dynamics of quantum systems for information processing and target time-series generation without precise control or fine-tuning of the Hamiltonian parameters. Nonetheless, their realization is challenging as quantum hardware with appropriate dynamics, robustness to noise, and ability to produce target steady states is required. To that end, we propose the disordered quantum homogenizer as an alternative platform, and prove it satisfies the necessary and sufficient conditions — textit{stability} and textit{contractivity} — of the reservoir dynamics, necessary for solving machine learning tasks with time-series input data streams. The results indicate that the quantum homogenization protocol, physically implementable as either nuclear magnetic resonance ensemble or a photonic system, can potentially function as a reservoir computer.

Formation of nonsingular spherical black holes with holonomy corrections

We present a canonical model of spherical gravity with covariant corrections motivated by loop quantum gravity. The effective Hamiltonian defines univocally a family of geometries that generalizes the Lema^itre-Tolman-Bondi spacetimes, and they can be matched to the vacuum of the theory across a timelike hypersurface comoving with the flow of matter. Such is precisely the complete spacetime picture of a spherical star subject to its own gravitational pull. The singularity gets replaced with a spacelike boundary in the trapped region of spacetime, where the curvature remains finite, and the area of the orbits of the spherical symmetry group attains its infimum. Observers falling into the black hole are doomed to travel forever towards this boundary without ever reaching it. The theory also predicts the formation of stable black-hole remnants of Planckian mass.