Decomposition of Time-Ordered Products and Path-Ordered Exponentials

We study the quantum evolution under the combined action of the exponentials of two not necessarily commuting operators. We consider the limit in which the two evolutions alternate at infinite frequency. This case appears in a plethora of situations, both in physics (Feynman integral) and mathematics (product formulas). We focus on the case in which the two evolution times are scaled differently in the limit and generalize standard techniques and results.

The usual time-ordering operation and the corresponding time-ordered exponential play a fundamental role in physics and applied mathematics. In this work we study a new approach to the understanding of time-ordering relying on recent progress made in the context of enveloping algebras of pre-Lie algebras. Various general formulas for pre-Lie and Rota-Baxter algebras are obtained in the process. Among others, we recover the noncommutative analog of the classical Bohnenblust-Sp...

In the present article, we review a continual effort on generalization of the Trotter formula to higher-order exponential product formulas. The exponential product formula is a good and useful approximant, particularly because it conserves important symmetries of the system dynamics. We focuse on two algorithms of constructing higher-order exponential product formulas. The first is the fractal decomposition, where we construct higher-order formulas recursively. The second is ...

We provide a simple method for the calculation of the terms c_n in the Zassenhaus product $e^{a+b}=e^a e^b \prod_{n=2}^{\infty} e^{c_n}$ for non-commuting a and b. This method has been implemented in a computer program. Furthermore, we formulate a conjecture on how to translate these results into nested commutators. This conjecture was checked up to order n=17 using a computer.

The path decomposition expansion is a path integral technique for decomposing sums over paths in configuration space into sums over paths in different spatial regions. It leads to a decomposition of the configuration space propagator across arbitrary surfaces in configuration space. It may be used, for example, in calculations of the distribution of first crossing times. The original proof relied heavily on the position representation and in particular on the properties of pa...

In a previous article, [arXiv:1501.02506, JPhysA {\bf48} (2015) 225207], we demonstrated that whenever $[X,Y] = u X + vY + cI$ the Baker-Campbell-Hausdorff formula reduces to the tractable closed-form expression \[ Z(X,Y)=\ln( e^X e^Y ) = X+Y+ f(u,v) \; [X,Y], \] where $f(u,v)=f(v,u)$ is explicitly given by \[ f(u,v) = {(u-v)e^{u+v}-(ue^u-ve^v)\over u v (e^u - e^v)} = {(u-v)-(ue^{-v}-ve^{-u})\over u v (e^{-v} - e^{-u})}. \] This is much more general than the results usually p...

We construct product formulas for exponentials of commutators and explore their applications. First, we directly construct a third-order product formula with six exponentials by solving polynomial equations obtained using the operator differential method. We then derive higher-order product formulas recursively from the third-order formula. We improve over previous recursive constructions, reducing the number of gates required to achieve the same accuracy. In addition, we dem...

There is a widespread belief in the quantum physical community, and in textbooks used to teach Quantum Mechanics, that it is a difficult task to apply the time evolution operator Exp{-itH/h} on an initial wave function. That is to say, because the hamiltonian operator generally is the sum of two operators, then it is a difficult task to apply the time evolution operator on an initial wave function f(x,0), for it implies to apply terms operators like (a+b)^n. A possible soluti...

The time-ordered exponential representation of a complex time evolution operator in the interaction picture is studied. Using the complex time evolution, we prove the Gell-Mann -- Low formula under certain abstract conditions, in mathematically rigorous manner. We apply the abstract results to quantum electrodynamics with cutoffs.

To efficiently implement many-particle quantum simulations on quantum computers we develop and present methods for inverting the Campbell-Baker-Hausdorff lemma to 3rd and 4th order in the commutator. That is, we reexpress exp{-i(H_1 + H_2 + ...)dt} as a product of factors exp(-i H_1 dt), exp(-i H_2 dt), ... which is accurate to 3rd or 4th order in dt.