1999/09/15 by J. Cox, C. Gattringer, Christof Gattringer +5
Physics and Astronomy · #Physics of Superconductivity and Magnetism #Quantum Chromodynamics and Particle Interactions #Theoretical and Computational Physics #cond-mat.str-el #hep-lat
paper · pdf · doi:10.1016/s0920-5632(00)91804-8
published as Nucl.Phys.Proc.Suppl. 83 (2000) 777-791 · 15 pages,LATTICE99
arxiv created 1999/09/15 · openalex publication_date 2000/04/01 · arxiv updated 2015/06/25 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
Numerical simulations of numerous quantum systems suffer from the notorious sign problem. Important examples include QCD and other field theories at non-zero chemical potential, at non-zero vacuum angle, or with an odd number of flavors, as well as the Hubbard model for high-temperature superconductivity and quantum antiferromagnets in an external magnetic field. In all these cases standard simulation algorithms require an exponentially large statistics in large space-time volumes and are thus impossible to use in practice. Meron-cluster algorithms realize a general strategy to solve severe sign problems but must be constructed for each individual case. They lead to a complete solution of the sign problem in several of the above cases.