Foundations1982

Simulating Physics with Computers

Autoren: Richard P. Feynman

Veröffentlicht: International Journal of Theoretical Physics 21, 467–488 (1982)

In einem Satz

Argues that simulating quantum systems on classical computers is fundamentally intractable, and proposes building computers that are themselves quantum — the origin of the field.

Kernpunkte

  • Shows the cost of classically simulating a quantum system grows exponentially with its size.
  • Proposes a 'universal quantum simulator' — a machine obeying quantum rules to model quantum physics.
  • Frames quantum simulation, not codebreaking, as the natural first application.

Einfach erklärt

Feynman noticed something awkward: to simulate even a modest collection of quantum particles, a classical computer needs to track a number of possibilities that doubles with every particle added. Thirty particles is already hard; fifty is hopeless. His response was to stop fighting nature and use it instead — build a computer whose own parts follow quantum rules, and let it imitate the system directly. That offhand proposal in a 1981 lecture became the founding idea of an entire field, and quantum simulation remains the application experts expect to pay off first.

Warum es wichtig ist

This is the paper that started quantum computing. It identified both the problem classical computers cannot solve and the shape of the machine that could, decades before the hardware existed.

Verwandte Glossarbegriffe