Trapped-Ion Quantum Simulation of an Ising Model with Transverse and Longitudinal Fields.

摘要

We perform a quantum simulation of an Ising model with long-range interactions and both transverse and longitudinal fields - the most general external field configuration - in a system of 6 to 10 trapped atomic ions. Quantum fluctuations at zero temperature drive the ground state spin ordering through several classical first-order phase transitions as the strength of the longitudinal field is increased. The Hamiltonian under study generates a fractal Devil's staircase structure and maps onto a large number of many-body and energy-optimization problems, showing how quantum simulation can potentially find solutions that are classically intractable.