Search

An adiabatic state preparation technique, called the adiabatic spiral, is proposed for the Heisenberg model. This technique is suitable for implementation on a number of quantum simulation platforms such as Rydberg atoms, trapped ions, or superconducting qubits. Classical simulations of small systems suggest that it can be successfully implemented in the near future. A comparison to Trotterized time evolution is performed and it is shown that the adiabatic spiral is able to outperform Trotterized adiabatics., 22 pages, 8 figures, published version, fixed missing acknowledgment

Adult learners benefit from a playful approach to learning (Whitton, 2018). Similarly, students experiencing immersive learning using virtual reality headsets can benefit from a playful and exploratory approach to language and culture learning (Arnold, 1979), which includes the opportunity to experiment and create content using accessible, code-free, and easy-to-adopt media and Maker techniques. This article proposes that this kind of content creation projects for students can result in an increased understanding and appreciation of the affordances of immersive technologies, especially when applied to cultural learning and second language acquisition. In these projects, students produce outcomes by learning to work together, use tools, develop skills, and reflect on their place within the work, as artistmakers, as language learners, and as creators of culture. Learners are encouraged to reflect on their process of Making, and in doing so broaden that reflection to encompass ideas around culture and language, the essence of their creative process coming from conceptual inquiry as much as from the practical Making. We propose ways to adopt immersive technologies and use a dedicated Maker and creator space to facilitate effective innovative language and culture pedagogy— one that might better support learning through creative exploration.

Increased availability of low-cost high-quality recording equipment, coupled with institutional beliefs about student digital expectations, has led to a greater use of educational video in Higher Education in recent years. Video has huge potential for engaging students and enhancing learning, but much educational video developed is underpinned by assumptions about the value of information transmission, and limited by cultural assumptions. It often fails to exploit its full potential to be immersive, emotionally resonant, interactive, experimental and innovative. This article explores the potential of playfulness in relation to educational video in Higher Education and presents a theoretical framework for understanding the possibilities of playful video by considering who is being playful (the person who makes the video or the personthat watches it) and when playfulness happens (synchronously or asynchronously to the video). From this analysis, we identified four different approaches to playful video in Higher Education: playful design by making films that areintrinsically playful; playful participation by creating opportunities for playful interaction with video; playful creation using playful approaches to video making; and playful action with videos that inspire or instigate subsequent play. In this article we aim to start a process of legitimising playful video in academia and open a conversation about its full possibilities.

This piece offers a reflection on how language learning and multicultural studies during the pandemic have highlighted the potential to help communities draw parallels with, and face wider issues concerning, minorities within a challenged society. Through storytelling, a novel approach to teaching and learning helps students find their voice and become active agents of change. A review of teaching and learning methods may bring about improvements both in academia and individual circumstances to help bridge the gap between loneliness and the need to be part of a wider social community. This article reiterates the importance of language learning, cultural understanding, and identity as useful employability skills for the new global graduates to support, rebuild, and unite communities especially in challenging times.

We construct doubled lattice Chern-Simons-Yang-Mills theories with discrete gauge group $G$ in the Hamiltonian formulation. Here, these theories are considered on a square spatial lattice and the fundamental degrees of freedom are defined on pairs of links from the direct lattice and its dual, respectively. This provides a natural lattice construction for topologically-massive gauge theories, which are invariant under parity and time-reversal symmetry. After defining the building blocks of the doubled theories, paying special attention to the realization of gauge transformations on quantum states, we examine the dynamics in the group space of a single cross, which is spanned by a single link and its dual. The dynamics is governed by the single-cross electric Hamiltonian and admits a simple quantum mechanical analogy to the problem of a charged particle moving on a discrete space affected by an abstract electromagnetic potential. Such a particle might accumulate a phase shift equivalent to an Aharonov-Bohm phase, which is manifested in the doubled theory in terms of a nontrivial ground-state degeneracy on a single cross. We discuss several examples of these doubled theories with different gauge groups including the cyclic group $\mathbb{Z}(k)\subset U(1)$, the symmetric group $S_3\subset O(2)$, the binary dihedral (or quaternion) group $\bar{D}_2\subset SU(2)$, and the finite group $\Delta(27)\subset SU(3)$. In each case the spectrum of the single-cross electric Hamiltonian is determined exactly. We examine the nature of the low-lying excited states in the full Hilbert space, and emphasize the role of the center symmetry for the confinement of charges. Whether the investigated doubled models admit a non-Abelian topological state which allows for fault-tolerant quantum computation will be addressed in a future publication., Comment: 42 pages, 5 figures; Revised version: Corrected typos and updated references

We resolve the real-time dynamics of a purely dissipative $s = 1/2$ quantum spin or, equivalently, hard-core boson model on a hypercubic $d$-dimensional lattice. The considered quantum dissipative process drives the system to a totally symmetric macroscopic superposition in each of the $S^3$ sectors. Different characteristic time scales are identified for the dynamics and we determine their finite-size scaling. We introduce the concept of cumulative entanglement distribution to quantify multiparticle entanglement and show that the considered protocol serves as an efficient method to prepare a macroscopically entangled Bose-Einstein condensate., Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures; version accepted for publication in PRA