Machine learning quantum phases of matter beyond the fermion sign problem

Abstract State-of-the-art machine learning techniques promise to become a powerful tool in statistical mechanics via their capacity to distinguish different phases of matter in an automated way. Here we demonstrate that convolutional neural networks (CNN) can be optimized for quantum many-fermion systems such that they correctly identify and locate quantum phase transitions in such systems. Using auxiliary-field quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) simulations to sample the many-fermion system, we show that the Green’s function holds sufficient information to allow for the distinction of different fermionic phases via a CNN. We demonstrate that this QMC + machine learning approach works even for systems exhibiting a severe fermion sign problem where conventional approaches to extract information from the Green’s function, e.g. in the form of equal-time correlation functions, fail.