Quantum simulation of nuclei improves on previous work with fewer qubits

Luca Spagnoli, Chiara Lissoni, and Alessandro Roggero of the University of Trento detail an improvement in simulating nuclear dynamics by shifting from second to first quantization. The researchers report the first complete characterization of resource requirements for modeling nuclear dynamics using the Leading Order pionless EFT Hamiltonian in first quantization, achieving polynomial scaling with the number of particles and logarithmic scaling with single-particle basis states. Their work suggests low-energy nuclear scattering simulations could be within reach using tens of millions of T gates and a few hundred logical qubits, indicating potential for early fault-tolerant quantum platforms. This represents a shift in computational efficiency for modeling nuclear reactions, a long-standing challenge for classical computers and a promising application for emerging quantum technologies.…