6–10 Jul 2026
University of the Western Cape
Africa/Johannesburg timezone
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Variational Monte Carlo and the Quantum Enhanced Metropolis-Hastings Algorithm

8 Jul 2026, 15:50
20m
Lecture Hall DL2 (University of the Western Cape)

Lecture Hall DL2

University of the Western Cape

Oral Presentation Track G - Theoretical and Computational Physics Theoretical and Computational Physics

Speaker

Mishka Naicker (University of KwaZulu-Natal)

Description

This work investigates a hybrid quantum–classical enhancement of the Metropolis–Hastings algorithm within a variational Monte Carlo framework. Using a single-thread Monte Carlo approach, we estimate the ground-state energy of a small Hamiltonian system by computing the dominant eigenvalue of a symmetric $3\times3$ matrix as a proof of concept.

A quantum-enhanced acceptance mechanism, inspired by the quantum Metropolis–Hastings algorithm, is integrated into the classical sampling procedure. The performance of this hybrid method is compared to the classical algorithm in terms of convergence speed and estimator precision. Numerical simulations demonstrate that the quantum-enhanced approach achieves faster convergence and improved accuracy for the test system, despite being implemented on classical hardware.

These results highlight the potential of quantum-assisted sampling techniques to improve the efficiency of Monte Carlo methods and provide a pathway toward scalable quantum algorithms for high-dimensional quantum systems.

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Authors

Prof. Mervlyn Moodley (University of KwaZulu-Natal) Mishka Naicker (University of KwaZulu-Natal)

Presentation materials

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