Papers

The weighted Max-Cut problem is an NP-hard problem with application implications. It is investigated on a cubic lattice with 113 nodes and mixed-signed random edge weights. For a fixed upper bound on edge weights, it has been demonstrated that the computational difficulty increases as the lower bound on edge weights becomes more negative. The solution time for the problem using a novel error-mitigated quantum annealing approach is compared with standard D-Wave quantum annealing (QA) and BQM hybrid solvers, as well as various classical solvers. For the QPU-embeddable weighted Max-Cut instances with mixed-signed edge weights, it has been quantitatively demonstrated that the SEMO (spin-error mitigation for optimisation) error-mitigated quantum annealing achieved substantially shorter time-to solution than standard D-Wave QA, D-Wave BQM, simulated annealing and Tabu search baselines. The error-mitigated quantum annealing approach presented in this article potentially elevates the efficiency and application scope of quantum annealing and would be applicable in solving other discrete optimisation problems that can be formulated as QUBO or Ising instances. The promising solution time advantage would be particularly impactful for time-critical optimisation applications.

Efficient stabilizer readout requiring multi-qubit coupling is a core bottleneck for quantum error correction. One feasible method is direct implementation of the controlled-U gate between one ancilla qubit and the data qubits assigned to stabilizer U measurements. We systematically analyze the native multi-target $\mathrm{C}^1\mathrm{NOT}^k$ gates proposed by Müller et al., which is realized via electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) and Rydberg blockade mechanisms. Using a microscopic open-system model, we analyze the gate's scaling with target number k and identify spontaneous emission, Doppler dephasing, target atom inter-coupling, and technical noise as major error contributions. We further optimize the protocol combining two-photon STIRAP control, heteronuclear interaction engineering, and waveform optimization. Our optimized heteronuclear protocol reaches fidelities of 98.03% ($\mathrm{C}^1\mathrm{NOT}^{1}$) and 96.54% ($\mathrm{C}^1\mathrm{NOT}^{4}$), in the presence of all primary noise sources and realistic experimental parameters. These results demonstrate that EIT-based multi-target gates serve as a practical building block for low-depth stabilizer readout.

We investigate a spin-$1/2$ anisotropic Heisenberg model on a lattice consisting of two identical bipartite sublattices. A family of exact eigenstates generated by the restricted spectrum generating algebra (RSGA) constitutes quantum many-body scar states, characterized by subextensive entanglement entropy and supporting. These scar states are magnon-pair condensates exhibiting off-diagonal long-range order (ODLRO). At the resonance point of the inter-sublattice interaction, the model exactly maps onto a mixed spin-$1$ and spin-$0$ XY model on a bipartite lattice, which decomposes into independent sub-Hamiltonians labeled by all possible spin configurations. Each spin-$0$ particle is dynamically isolated from its neighbors and acts as a kinetic constraint, giving rise to emergent Hilbert space fragmentation (HSF). Our work establishes an exactly solvable platform in which quantum many-body scars, magnon-pair condensation exhibiting off-diagonal long-range order, and Hilbert space fragmentation naturally coexist.

Quantum federated learning (QFL) lets multiple quantum clients collaboratively train quantum neural networks (QNNs) without sharing private local data. However, existing QFL methods commonly assume that all clients use the same ansatz, overlooking how heterogeneous client data affects ansatz suitability. Under class-imbalanced non-IID data, different clients may favor different ansatz structures, so a fixed ansatz can lead to unstable and unfair performance across clients. In this paper, we propose PAS-QFL, a Personalized Ansatz Selection framework for QFL under client data heterogeneity. Rather than treating the ansatz as a monolithic structure, PAS-QFL decomposes each client QNN into a globally shared ansatz and a client-specific private ansatz, and personalizes the structure of the private ansatz rather than only its parameters. The shared ansatz is placed first and selected by a stability-aware cross-client criterion so that its parameters can be reliably aggregated, while the private ansatz serves as a personalized decision head, selected per client by local Macro-F1 to adapt the shared representation to its local data. During training, each client updates both its shared and private parameters locally but uploads only the shared parameters, so federated aggregation stays well-defined while each client keeps its own private structure. PAS-QFL uses Macro-F1 as the primary selection metric to avoid misleading accuracy under class imbalance. Experiments on heterogeneous QFL tasks show that PAS-QFL improves average Macro-F1 over the existing fixed-ansatz QFL baselines, demonstrating the value of personalizing the ansatz structure for practical QFL.

Variational quantum algorithms based on qudits have attracted significant attention in recent years. However, as in their qubit-based counterparts, challenges such as barren plateaus and the design of efficient ansatz remain major obstacles. In this work, we propose to address these issues through a qudit implementation of the ADAPT-VQE algorithm, which constructs the ansatz iteratively. Specifically, we introduce an operator pool inspired by adiabatic evolution enhanced with counterdiabatic driving for ansatz construction and employ it to solve Max 3-Cut. We show that the warm-start strategy inherent to ADAPT-VQE, together with an ansatz construction based on counterdiabatic operators, achieves higher accuracy and lower native gates implementation than approaches on fixed ansatz. Furthermore, we show that, in qudit-based quantum computing, ADAPT-VQE with a counterdiabatic operator pool can navigate rough optimization landscapes with local traps through the burrowing mechanism, suggesting robustness against barren plateau effects and providing a scalable framework for variational quantum algorithms with qudits.

We present a Quantum Boltzmann Equation self-consistent-field (QBE-SCF) formulation for molecular electronic structure in which the one-electron reduced density matrix is propagated in an atomic orbital basis and relaxed by a Bhatnagar-Gross-Krook collision operator toward a Fermi-Dirac equilibrium defined by the instantaneous Fock matrix. At stationarity, the converged density and Fock matrices satisfy $[\mathbf{F},\mathbf{P}]=0$, the Hartree-Fock condition. While the zero-temperature equilibrium target reduces to the integer Aufbau projector, the damped collision operator ensures the steady-state density matrix is not necessarily idempotent. This kinetic relaxation affords a dual pathway to resolve mean-field singularities. For spatial degeneracies, such as H$_3$ symmetric dissociation, zero-temperature kinetic ergodicity fractionalizes the active space to recover the Generalized Valence Bond (GVB) limit. For the conical intersection in BeH$_2$ and the H$_4$ structural distortion ($D_{2h} \rightarrow D_{4h} \rightarrow D_{2h}$), finite-temperature entropic regularization recovers correlated adiabatic surfaces from a real-valued single-reference density. By maintaining stable numerical convergence across basis-set hierarchies and resolving static correlation without multi-reference wavefunctions, these results establish kinetic relaxation as a synthesis of single-reference electronic structure and quantum statistical mechanics.

Periodically driven quantum systems are commonly modeled using master equations constructed in the eigenbasis of an undriven Hamiltonian, implicitly assuming that environmental dissipation couples to static energy transitions even under strong time-periodic driving. The validity of this approximation beyond weak or near-resonant driving remains poorly understood. To address the need for a more self-consistent quantum theory approach, we formulate a nonsecular Floquet–Markov generalized master equation (F-GME) in the quasienergy basis, treating interaction-induced (internal) and drive-induced (external) nonperturbative dressing on an equal footing. We subsequently investigate dissipation in two minimal driven open quantum systems—a harmonically driven two-level system and a harmonically driven coupled-two-level-system—each weakly coupled to a Markovian bath. Comparing the F-GME to a time-independent dressed-basis master equation, we show that even for a flat-bath spectral density and weak dissipation, the two approaches can yield qualitatively different steady-state populations and emission spectra. We resolve dissipation into drive-assisted sideband processes decaying via Floquet extended-space quasienergy channels, and show these channels can hybridize through nonsecular couplings into collective Floquet–Liouville modes governing observable spectral resonances. This analysis demonstrates that time-independent dissipative descriptions can incorrectly weight multiphoton Floquet transitions by collapsing quasienergy-resolved decay pathways into static energy gaps. The F-GME framework provides a systematic diagnostic for identifying regimes where Floquet-consistent dissipation is essential and clarifies the physical origin of discrepancies between commonly used master-equation approaches.

Growing awareness of the impact of quantum threat on classical cryptography directly translates into a growing demand for accurate network simulation tools capable of estimating the integration effects of quantum-safe cryptography in current systems. In particular, the adoption of Post-Quantum Cryptography (PQC) has a direct impact on the performance of network endpoints and transmission overhead. This also affects the scalability of widely adopted security protocols such as TLS and SSH. In this paper, we present a throughput-oriented analytical model that provides a tight upper bound on the maximum sustainable rate of post-quantum secure connection establishment in TLS and SSH. This model takes into account both endpoint and network capacity constraints, decomposing the handshake process into dominant cryptographic operation time and network transmission time. Identifying the bottleneck allows us to derive the achievable throughput in terms of handshakes per second. The experimental results provided show the accuracy of the model against the data obtained from an experimental testbed using, among others, NIST standard primitives from FIPS 203, 204, and 205, including ML-KEM and ML-DSA. Finally, we integrate our model into a network environment and demonstrate how it can be leveraged to enable efficient resource allocation among multiple endpoints, optimizing PQC traffic in multiple-unicast scenarios.

Information-based diffusion schedules organize the reverse problem by prescribing how much source information remains after each forward step. For mixed-state quantum diffusion, density-level targets need not correspond to trajectories reachable from the current realization. We introduce channel-constrained information scheduling: each step optimizes over source-blind pure-state refinements reachable from the current state-resolved record through the prescribed channel. This defines a channel-constrained information clock $V_\xi$, whose inverse selects the least-corrupting step that reaches a target information level. Recursive inversion constructs a realizable equal-information schedule minimizing the worst source-information burden in Bayes reverse prediction. We establish attainment, continuity, monotonicity, convexity, finite support, and exact primal/dual formulations for $V_\xi$. We further give a sharp structural characterization: binary-qubit depolarizing trajectories attain the density-level Belavkin–Staszewski envelope, whereas every $d\ge3$ admits binary noncommuting families with a strict static–dynamic separation. Qutrit experiments show that the proposed scheduler nearly equalizes the realized multi-step burden, and learned reverse predictors recover the predicted allocation.

For a convex function $f \colon \mathbb{R}^d \to \mathbb{R}$, the problem of sampling from a distribution proportional to $e^{-f(x)}$ is called log-concave sampling. In many practical scenarios, the function $f(x)$ turns out to admit a local decomposition $f(x) = \sum_{a=1}^R \psi_a(x_{S_a})$. In this paper, we consider log-concave sampling using local queries, i.e., evaluation and gradient queries to each clause $\psi_a(\cdot)$, which can be computationally much cheaper than the queries to $f(x)$ itself. We show that if each coordinate appears in only a small number of clauses, there is a quantum algorithm for strongly log-concave sampling using $\widetilde{O}(\sqrt{\kappa}d)$ local queries, where $\kappa$ is the condition number. This improves the prior best classical result $\widetilde{O}(\kappa d)$ due to Ascolani, Lavenant, and Zanella (Ann. Probab. 2026) and the quantum result $\widetilde{O}(\sqrt{\kappa} d^2)$ implied by Childs et al. (NeurIPS 2022). Our quantum sampler applies to a broad class of locally structured models from statistical computing and machine learning, with representative examples including Gaussian Markov random fields, finite-element latent Gaussian models, and sparse generalized linear models. These results demonstrate that local structure is not merely an implementation detail, but a quantum algorithmic resource for high-dimensional sampling.

Simulating real-time dynamics in lattice gauge theories (LGTs) is severely constrained by the circuit depth overhead of standard fermion-to-qubit mappings, which scale linearly or quadratically with system size. To overcome this depth-scaling bottleneck, we introduce the Hardware-Aware Lattice Optimization (HALO) compiler, an architecture executing global time-evolution in an immutable $\mathcal{O}(1)$ circuit depth per Trotter step. By natively mapping composite gauge links to hardware topologies, HALO achieves a $91.36\%$ reduction in entangling gate overhead compared to unoptimized Jordan-Wigner baselines, compressing a 16-qubit global step to 56 CNOTs and bypassing extensive $\mathcal{O}(N)$ scaling limits. We validate this compiler on IBM superconducting transmon processors by simulating the mesoscopic Quantum Link Model (QLM) truncation of the Schwinger model. Coupling $\mathcal{O}(1)$ compilation with Zero-Noise Extrapolation (ZNE), we track localized string rupture, extracting the dynamical crossover of pair creation at $t \approx 0.790$ with an $18.3 \pm 2.2\%$ rupture probability. Furthermore, we map the dynamical phase diagram, identifying the confinement phase boundary at $g_c = 1.0$. Finally, we introduce a scalable 2D unit-cell blueprint, paving a direct pathway toward the fault-tolerant simulation of two-dimensional Quantum Chromodynamics (QCD).

A standard Bell observable is a scalar correlation associated with a selected pair of local measurement directions. We formulate it as a projection of a complete two-particle correlation tensor and distinguish two angular sectors. The central result is a reversal of the sign multiplying the cosine law: for coincident calibrated settings, the Bell observable is positive for photons and negative for a fermionic singlet. This distinction provides an operational criterion for experimental identification. For photons, the positive sign follows from averaging two projection amplitudes over the complete non-inertial phase interval; the fermionic sign follows from the negative exchange holonomy of the phase–momentum sector. Mapping phase directions to linear-polarizer axes produces the corresponding double-angle dependence. The photon Stokes tensor has positive linear-polarization components and a negative circular-polarization component, whereas the fermionic singlet has an isotropic negative tensor. We introduce a motion-dependent extended tensor and a frequency-dependent non-inertial susceptibility. A phase-synchronous two-arm experiment combines optical modulation, rotation, and seeded multiaxial piezoelectric vibration. Independent motion measurements separate common and differential components and allow controlled variation from correlated to independent and oppositely driven motion; a single rigid platform is the simpler common-frame limit. Bell-setting and state-correlation vectors express the sign reversal as a scalar projection. The construction yields binary joint probabilities and recovers the Tsirelson bound with oppositely signed optimal CHSH combinations.

Counting the global optima of a classical optimization problem is a #P-hard task. We develop the canonical thermal pure quantum (CTPQ) state-based degeneracy counting (CTPQsd#) algorithm that determines the number of global optima of a classical optimization problem P by measuring only a small probe S, without finding individual minima. The method exploits a perturbative relation between the decoherence measure of S and the degeneracy of P when S and P are together in a CTPQ state. We provide the first numerical demonstration that this relation can be used to count the global minima, applying it to problems encoded by diagonal random-energy Hamiltonians as a maximally unstructured testbed for classical binary optimization problems. Classical simulations of up to 20 problem qubits quantify the algorithm's sensitivity to variations in the temperature of the CTPQ state, the Hamiltonian energy range, the problem size, and degeneracy. We establish the temperature threshold for determining the exact degeneracy and identify a second, lower threshold that provides a temperature window to count near-degenerate minima within a user-defined energy tolerance. By confining measurement to S, the protocol replaces tomography over the exponentially large problem Hilbert space with tomography over a small probe represented by only four qubits.

Partial coherence is commonly viewed as a mechanism that reduces contrast or smooths intensity structure. Here we show that it can also encode hidden transverse-flow topology. Starting from the cross-spectral density, we formulate a generalized transverse flux, an effective velocity field, and the associated flux trajectories for quasi-monochromatic partially coherent paraxial beams. This construction converts two-point correlation phases into local transport information and reduces to the usual coherent energy-flow picture in the single-mode limit. Because the generalized flux is obtained through a local differential operation on the cross-spectral density, the proposed trajectories can, in principle, be reconstructed from measurements of the complex second-order coherence function, without requiring direct measurement of individual optical paths. Two analytical beam families expose this hidden topology. In twisted Gaussian Schell-model beams, a Gaussian intensity hides a distributed rotational flow with nonzero vorticity. In Laguerre-Christoffel-Darboux beams, sources with identical intensity profiles can have different flux topology, producing either spiral or purely radial trajectories. Thus, intensity and coherence magnitude do not exhaust the physical information contained in the cross-spectral density: partial coherence can reorganize the hidden topology of transverse optical transport.

Noisy logic operations on a quantum computational register – e.g., one or more qubits – can be described by transfer matrices (a.k.a. CPTP maps or superoperators) that act linearly on the density matrix representing the register's quantum state. Collectively, these operations form a gate set. Gate sets have a gauge freedom; many gate sets that appear different actually predict the same experimental outcomes. A property of a gate set can be observable (and thus physically relevant) only if it is gauge-invariant. Unfortunately, no good gauge-invariant parameterizations of gate sets are known. We introduce the next best thing, a perturbative gauge-invariant parameterization of small Markovian errors in gate sets. We construct vector spaces of properties that are first-order gauge-invariant (FOGI). We show how to construct and understand FOGI properties, how to use them as coordinates to parameterize gate sets without gauge freedom, and how to extract approximately gauge-invariant error metrics.

Machine-learned exchange-correlation functionals correct band gaps at near-semilocal cost, while density-functional tight binding reaches the $10^3$-$10^6$-atom regime; combining them assumes that a better parent yields a better parameterization, but we show it does not. Current-generation functionals are orbital-dependent generalized Kohn-Sham operators, whereas the parameterization channel is built on a multiplicative potential, preventing exact representation. Using the transfer ratio, the surviving fraction of a parent-level change, we find anti-transfer: coherently negative ratios across four covalent semiconductors move the gap in the wrong direction, consistent with a molecular proxy and an r$^2$SCAN control. The minimal-basis overgap is dominated by the on-site convention rather than basis incompleteness; correcting the on-site block removes most of it, while one $d$-polarization shell closes a further $16$-$40%$, depending on the placement of the empty $d$ level, which no free-atom eigenvalue uniquely fixes. Occupied-manifold enhancements, ionic and closed-shell repulsive potentials, and rocksalt-oxide gaps inherit, whereas elemental and III-V covalent networks inherit neither gaps nor repulsive potentials and oxide networks inherit only the latter. We screen 23 elements and release the parameter sets, showing that the transfer ratio provides a cheap pre-test before any parameterization campaign.

The ZX calculus is a graphical language for reasoning about quantum processes. In this paper, we develop a minimal pure-qubit ZX calculus based on the work of Vilmart [arXiv:1812.09114], Backens, Perdrix, and Wang [arXiv:1709.08903], and Stoltz [arXiv:2606.12383]. This resolves a problem that has remained open for nearly a decade, since completeness was first proved. Specifically, we show that $(I_r)$ is derivable and establish the necessity of $(B)$ and $(I_g)$, yielding two complete and minimal rulesets.

Chiral light-matter interactions lie at the heart of emerging technologies such as quantum network protocols and quantum logic gates. In the few photon regime, it has been shown that chiral interactions between photons and a waveguide-embedded two-level quantum emitter can break reciprocity and impart a directional $\pi$ phase shift while the transmission remains intact. In this work, we present a model for multicolor, chiral nonlinear interactions in waveguides using a Green's Tensor formalism. We challenge previously held notions and demonstrate the complex photon dynamics hidden in multicolor light-matter interactions in the few photon regime. By modulating a stronger control beam, we can manipulate a weaker signal beam that contains much less than a single photon per emitter lifetime, on average. We develop equations for the transmission of the signal photons and removing the control photons to uncover the true strength of these nonlinearities, which we show is stronger than what is possible in symmetric geometries. The model predicts tunable unity extinction and up to 30% amplification in the signal, a $\sim$100x increase from standard predictions in which control photons are present. We also predict a tunable 0-$\pi$ phase shift via control modulation with significant robustness to emitter imperfections. Our model opens a new regime of directional nonlinear quantum light-matter interactions for study, providing a route to efficient all-optical control of photons.

In this work, we demonstrate hybrid High Performance Computing-Quantum Computing (HPCQC) workflows on a production petascale system. The demonstration combines three components: the SuperMUC-NG supercomputer at the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre (LRZ), a 20-qubit superconducting quantum processor provided by IQM Quantum Computers (IQM), and Munich Quantum Valley (MQV)'s Munich Quantum Software Stack (MQSS). Integrating quantum processors into High Performance Computing (HPC) systems requires a heterogeneous software stack capable of orchestrating classical and quantum resources within established supercomputing workflows. MQSS treats Quantum Processing Units (QPUs) as scheduler-managed accelerators and it performs resource coordination following a two-level scheduling scheme. Slurm performs system-level allocation by exposing QPUs as Generic RESources (GRES), while the MQSS Quantum Resource Manager & Compiler Infrastructure (QRM&CI) performs just-in-time compilation and subsequent dispatch of quantum circuits. To integrate with existing HPC operations without modifying the scheduler core, MQSS introduces an open-source SLURM Plugin Suite based on Prolog/Epilog scripts and SPANK modules. Experimental results show that hybrid HPCQC workflows can be executed without significant latency overhead compared to conventional workloads. The presented architecture provides a portable integration model for quantum accelerators on large-scale HPC systems and is directly applicable to next-generation Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) Cray platforms, including LRZ's upcoming 'Blue Lion' supercomputer.

Identifying universal, robust, and interpretable signatures of the onset of ergodicity remains a major challenge. The adiabatic gauge potential has been noted to act as a sensitive probe of quantum chaos. In this work, we generalize the features of the adiabatic gauge potential to multi-parameter perturbations, yielding an emergent quantum geometry. We dub this geometry the Hilbert-Killing metric, which allows us to study the onset of ergodicity in many-body quantum systems. Our Hilbert-Killing metric sensitively probes the boundary between ergodic and integrable regimes across all investigated geometric components. This boundary is uniquely identified by the presence of the consistently fastest growth with system size, which is corroborated by extensive numerical investigations of the Ising and PXP models.

This work develops the deterministic, discrete proper-time framework introduced in our previous work, Eur.\ Phys.\ J.\ C 86 (2026) 829, in which quantum field theory emerges as an effective infrared description characterized by a running Planck constant. There, the effective quantization scale was inferred from the microscopic multiplicity unresolved by coarse-graining. Here, we provide its dynamical and operatorial realization and extend the construction to fermionic degrees of freedom. First, consistency under changes of macroscopic resolution leads to the structure of the Renormalization Group Equation, while the running Planck constant governs the crossover toward the deterministic regime. Second, we represent the reversible microscopic dynamics through finite-difference translations in field-configuration space. After coarse-graining, the resulting operator-valued canonical commutation relations reproduce the same quantization scale previously obtained from statistical microstate counting, thereby linking microscopic evolution to the emergent canonical algebra. Third, representing the same update within a Grassmann algebra yields the corresponding canonical anticommutation relations. The bosonic and fermionic sectors thus inherit a common effective Planck constant without introducing an independent fermionic update or quantization scale. Finally, we discuss possible implications for high-energy loop amplitudes and effective Hawking radiation.

Chiral quantum nonlinearities that arise when light interacts with quantum emitters are known to modulate only the phase but not the amplitude of scattered photons, enabling the creation of non-reciprocal photonic elements, quantum logic gates, and quantum network protocols. In this work, we show that the addition of a second photon beam drastically changes this picture, enabling both phase and amplitude modulation. Surprisingly, coherent photon transfer between the different beams enables a stronger amplitude modulation than standard symmetric interactions. This is most obvious in the coherent, three-photon amplification, which we predict peaks with a 30% efficiency in a chiral geometry, 3x the efficiency of the symmetric configuration. Our results uncover a new regime of chiral quantum optics and provide a route towards more efficient all-optical control at few-photon energies.

The complementary quantum correlations (CQC) relation bounds the sum of two classical mutual informations, obtained from local mutually unbiased measurements, by the quantum mutual information of the premeasurement state. We refute it. Separable rank-two counterexamples exist in every local dimension pair \(m\times n\) with \(m,n\ge3\), with closed-form excess at least \(1/(8m^2n^2)\) nats, and in every qubit–qudit pair \(2\times n\) with \(n\ge3\) except \(n=3,5\); every covered pair also admits full-rank separable counterexamples. We then analyse the two residual qubit–qudit dimensions. A dimension-free entropy envelope replaces the natural quadratic majorant and lowers the requirement for closing the equal-prior orthogonal two-ray family from a triangular-discrimination bound \(S\le8/3\) to \(S\le3.8265583\ldots\); the associated gate matrix has trace exactly two, so its spectral test collapses to a single eigenvalue-free scalar; and the exact identity \(X=1-4\operatorname{Var}(c)\) turns the prime-Fourier full-spark barrier into a variance bound. A \(128\)-bit interval cover then closes that family at \(2\times3\) with gap at least \(0.012021\) nats, and at \(2\times5\) an exact saturator attaining \(S=(14+2\sqrt5)/5\) refutes three competing routes. We also give a state-dependent corrected inequality that is universal, and show it is incomparable with CQC already at \(2\times2\). Finally we quantify why the original searches had essentially no power to find these states: the violating set is a sliver against the low-rank boundary, the witness lies \(7.3\) standard deviations below the Hilbert–Schmidt mean, the bases must be aligned to about nine degrees (\(\sim10^{-21}\) of frames), and extrapolating the sample minimum demands \(10^{10}\) to \(10^{18}\) samples against the \(10^7\) ever run.

The partition function is statistical mechanics' answer to an exponentially large spectrum, distilling it into a single analytic object whose temperature dependence resolves the full structure of the underlying ensemble. We show that magic, the resource separating universal quantum computation from classically simulable stabilizer dynamics, admits precisely such a description. Mapping the Pauli spectrum of a quantum state onto the energy levels of a fictitious many-body system, the Pauli gas, we construct its canonical partition function, the stabilizer partition function, and from its associated free energy a magic monotone that we call the stabilizer work. Both these objects are analytic functions of an inverse-temperature-like parameter and are efficiently estimable via Bell sampling. The framework is analytically tractable. We derive exact ensemble-averaged partition functions for Haar-random, $\nu$-compressible, and pseudomagic states, together with concentration guarantees. We show that for every value of its parameter, the stabilizer work is a faithful, Subadditive magic monotone, while remaining efficiently accessible on quantum hardware and admitting an operational interpretation. Unlike measures that probe a single moment of the Pauli distribution, the stabilizer work is intrinsically moment-generating. As the temperature is tuned from high to low, it interpolates continuously between the stabilizer 2-Rényi entropy and the stabilizer nullity, revealing two previously disconnected monotones as limiting cases of a single object. We demonstrate the framework on low-rank stabilizer simulation, resource interconversion, molecular ground states, and quantum many-body systems. A thermodynamics of magic is therefore not merely an analogy but a working toolkit, opening a statistical-mechanical route to magic properties of quantum systems that no single measure can access.

Recent experiments reporting cavity-vacuum-modified superconductivity raise a fundamental question: under what conditions can vacuum electromagnetic fluctuations increase a superconducting transition temperature? Starting from a Ginzburg–Landau theory minimally coupled to a quantized cavity mode, we derive the cavity-induced renormalization of the superconducting free energy. This correction comprises a positive diamagnetic contribution and a negative paramagnetic exchange contribution. We prove that, in a passive cavity, the latter cannot exceed the former, establishing a no-go theorem: within minimal cavity electrodynamics, vacuum fluctuations suppress, rather than enhance, superconductivity. We then identify two routes beyond this constraint, both involving additional collective degrees of freedom. In the collective-mode route, a cavity-active excitation amplifies the attractive paramagnetic contribution. In the competing-order route, the cavity weakens an order that competes with superconductivity, thereby indirectly enhancing superconductivity. Together, these results turn the no-go theorem into a practical design principle: cavity superconductivity enhancement requires an additional cavity-coupled material mode that either strengthens paramagnetic exchange or suppresses a competing order.

We implemented on GPU a mixed quantum-classical Liouville molecular dynamics simulation based on a momentum-jump-free theory. The trajectory spawning that was previously implemented on CPU for sampling enhancement was eliminated to avoid the overhead of thread divergence and dynamic memory allocation on the GPU. This achieved a speedup of an order of magnitude compared to the CPU computation with spawning, as well as a linear scaling with respect to the number of sampling trajectories.

Non-Hermitian lattice Hamiltonians generally exhibit strong boundary sensitivity, with periodic and open boundary conditions producing distinct density of states (DOS) in the complex-energy plane. This has led to the view that extended non-Hermitian systems lack a unique bulk DOS, with different prescriptions representing inequivalent bulk physics. Here, we show that this apparent ambiguity is largely illusory. For any finite-range tight-binding Hamiltonian, we establish a universal bulk structure: all DOS definitions arising as thermodynamic limits of finite systems share identical multipole moments and generate identical bulk dynamics at finite times and for observables measured far from boundaries. This universality is intimately tied to the thermodynamic Green's functions, which we show to be independent of the boundary condition for large enough complex frequencies. Among all equivalent descriptions, we identify the Brown measure - obtained via Hermitization and resolvent analysis - as a canonical and convenient representative of the bulk DOS, defined directly from the infinite-volume Hamiltonian. We further show that point-gap topology imposes additional universal constraints: boundary-dependent Green's functions are forced to coincide throughout topologically trivial point gaps. This, in particular, provides a systematic criterion, valid in arbitrary dimension, for determining where and how eigenvalues of different boundary truncations can accumulate in the complex plane, and precisely delineates the regime in which the DOS ambiguity retains physical significance.

Measurement and feedback jointly prepare coherence and select finite-time dynamics in quantum information engines. Complementing a companion experimental realization, we develop a mechanism-resolved theory of the resulting work statistics and temporal correlations. The con?ditional work separates into population transfer and a phase-sensitive coherence-transition inter?ference term. Symmetric full counting statistics maps this interference to an equal-and-opposite half-quantum pair in the work quasiprobability, entering odd moments while leaving even moments fixed by endpoint mixing. An outcome-resolved tilted kernel then propagates these statistics through the correlated measurement record, yielding finite-cycle and fixed-time fluctuation corrections. The same memory reduces the reversible record-reset cost from the one-symbol entropy to the entropy rate. Our results link coherent work statistics, feedback memory, and information thermodynamics

How many Slater determinants does an accurate variational description of interacting fermions require? Exact expansions in a finite basis need combinatorially many, and state-of-the-art fermionic neural quantum states stack growing numbers of them. We prove that, in the norms that govern variational calculations, at most two are needed, independently of the number of particles and of the target accuracy. A single universal Slater determinant-specified in advance, independent of both the system and the state-multiplied by a smooth bosonic wave function approximates any fermionic wave function in up to three spatial dimensions in the first-order Sobolev norm, which controls the variational energy. Reaching the second-order Sobolev norm-for Coulomb interactions, the domain of the Hamiltonian, which bounds the variance of the local energy at the core of variational Monte Carlo-requires at most one additional fixed determinant, and only in three dimensions. Antisymmetry therefore costs at most two universal determinants and no expressiveness: generalized Slater-Jastrow neural quantum states are variationally complete.

Open quantum system dynamics is efficiently described by the quantum master equation formalism. Therein, quantum master equations in Lindblad form constitute an important subclass describing Markovian dynamics. When an open quantum system is in an out-of-equilibrium state, an exchange of particles between the open system and reservoirs takes place yielding to a non-zero average net current and associated current fluctuations, which can be characterised with the quantum jump formalism for quantum master equations expressed in Lindblad form. However, a large class of quantum master equations cannot be described by Lindblad dynamics. Here we assess the validity and the effectiveness of the quantum jump formalism when the dissipators in the quantum master equation describe a non-additive, open quantum system dynamics. We find that an additive unravelling of the non-additive quantum master equation does not generate a completely-positive dynamics in the scenario of perfect jump detection. Nevertheless, allowing for an imperfect jump detection scenario, we find that an additive unravelling is possible that reproduces the current and the fluctuations obtained via the Landauer-Büttiker formalism.