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Description
The Quantum Approximate Optimization Algorithm (QAOA)[1] is one of the leading variational quantum algorithms used to prepare the ground state of gauge theories. The design of QAOA is under-pinned by the adiabatic theorem. Recently, there has been a proposed variation of QAOA, DC-QAOA[2], that incorporates counterdiabatic driving in order to speed up the adiabatic process, leading to reduced circuit depths and runtimes. In this work, we use QAOA and DC- QAOA, along with other counterdiabatic variations [3, 4], to find the ground state of the Schwinger model and compare the results to show how counterdiabatic driving can be used to improve the ground state preparation of gauge theories.
References:
[1] Edward Farhi, Jeffrey Goldstone, and Sam Gutmann. A quantum approximate optimization algorithm, 2014.
[2] P. Chandarana, N. N. Hegade, K. Paul, F. Albarran-Arriagada, E. Solano, A. del Campo, and Xi Chen. Digitized-counterdiabatic quantum approximate optimization algorithm. Physical Review Research, 4(1), February 2022.
[3] Pranav Chandarana, Narendra N. Hegade, Iraitz Montalban, Enrique Solano, and Xi Chen. Digitized counterdiabatic quantum algorithm for protein folding. Physical Review Applied, 20(1), 2023
[4] Ruoqian Xu, Sebastian V. Romero, Jialiang Tang, Yue Ban, and Xi Chen. Digitized counterdiabatic quantum optimization for bin packing problem. EPJ Quantum Technology, 12(1), August 2025.