Quantum Device Simulates Matter Popping into Existence

A team led by faculty at the Duke Quantum Center (DQC), in collaboration with researchers at JQI, has used a small number of atoms to simulate an aspect of the extreme physics at play in modern particle colliders and in the chaotic environment that existed shortly after the big bang.

This approach, described in a paper published in the journal Nature Physics on Sept. 23, 2026, demonstrates the viability of trapped-ion quantum computers to begin probing fundamental questions about the universe. The experiment emulates a phenomenon called string breaking in which two connected fundamental building blocks of matter stretch apart, eventually creating so much energy that new particles “pop into existence” when the connection snaps.  

“Quantum computer simulations provide the best platform to investigate complex questions like matter formation, short of having witnessed the big bang itself,” says Christopher Monroe, a professor of electrical and computer engineering and physics at Duke and a College Park Professor of Physics at the University of Maryland (UMD), who led this research. “These findings signal a marked development in the quantum science field and open new avenues for us to understand string-breaking dynamics.”

This research was conducted by an international collaboration that also included researchers working at Oxford University, the California Institute of Technology, Cornell University and KU Leuven. The results join two similar published findings, led by other research teams in the field, which simulated the same phenomenon on different quantum computer platforms.

"This beautiful experiment builds on an earlier collaboration with Chris Monroe, in which we demonstrated the closely related phenomenon of confinement,” says JQI Fellow Alexey Gorshkov, who is also a theoretical physicist at the National Institute for Standards and Technology, a Fellow of the Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science (QuICS) and a Senior Investigator at the National Science Foundation Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Robust Quantum Simulation (RQS). “My graduate student Fangli Liu was the one who first got me interested in simulating high-energy physics with trapped-ion chains. Bringing together experimentalists and theorists with different areas of expertise has been incredibly rewarding."

The Building Blocks of Matter

The fundamental building blocks of matter, quarks, only exist when bound together inside particles such as protons and neutrons. They are about a billion times smaller than an atom and can’t currently be observed directly. Pairs of these tiny, charged particles are held together by a force that acts like a taut string; quarks want to stick together, and it takes quite a bit of energy to pull them apart. 

But once they are forced apart, the energy built up in their connection can be enough to create more charged particles. When this happens, the string snaps, leaving two or more pairs of particles rather than one. This process requires so much energy, however, that it only happens in extreme environments like the Large Hadron Collider or the aftermath of the big bang. 

In the new study, the team successfully observed analogous string-breaking dynamics on a trapped-ion quantum platform. Quantum simulators, with their high degree of controllability, can be programmed to recreate the real-world processes occurring at the atomic or even subatomic quantum scales.

“Working at the intersection of quantum simulation and high-energy physics is incredibly exciting,” said Arinjoy De, the first author on the paper and a former JQI and Duke graduate student who now works at QuEra Computing. “By simulating quark confinement and string-breaking phenomena in a controlled lab environment, we're opening up new pathways for experimental investigations into the behavior of matter at its most fundamental level.”

How the Simulation Worked

To perform the simulation, the team encoded a string-breaking model into a chain of 13 trapped ions. Using precisely controlled laser beams, researchers were able to tune the interactions among the ions. These interactions effectively control the energy to the system in a way that mimics the stretching and eventual breaking of a string. 

By preparing the system out of equilibrium and tracking its evolution over time, the researchers observed the emergence of effective charges and reconstructed the resulting string dynamics.

The team also simulated the process on a classical computer and confirmed that their experimental results were accurate. As the problem size grows in future experiments, however, only quantum computers will be able to solve these problems. 

The string-breaking process in other models was also recreated by teams led by Google and QuEra Computing on platforms built using superconducting circuits and neutral atoms, respectively, which each have their own advantages and challenges.

“These are the three platforms leading the charge in quantum computing, so it’s a nice benchmark and comparison for the quantum community,” Monroe says.

The authors say that the trapped-ion platform results mark an exciting step forward in building quantum simulations complex enough to exceed the capabilities of even the largest supercomputers, which will eventually allow researchers to explore the most fundamental questions of the universe, like matter evolution after the big bang. 

“As a physicist, it is incredibly exciting to investigate the conditions of the early universe in an atomic-level computing machine,” says Zohreh Davoudi, an associate professor of physics at UMD, who was part of the research team and is also a QuICS Fellow and a Senior Investigator at RQS. “Even the slightest insights from an out-of-equilibrium physics model will guide us in the future.”

This story was written by Andrew Tie and originally published by the Duke Pratt School of Engineering. It has been adapted here with minor changes.

This work was supported by the Department of Energy (DE-SC0020312, DE-SC0025341, DESC0019040, DE-SC0024220, DE-SC0020271), National Science Foundation (OMA-2120757), Air Force Office of Scientific Research, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency and Amazon Web Services.