I am a researcher at Sandia National Laboratories in Livermore, CA, working on semiclassics, quantum information, and quantum gravity.
I blog about some of my research, quantum information, and physics in general here.
Sandia National Laboratories is a multimission laboratory managed and operated by National Technology & Engineering Solutions of Sandia, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International Inc., for the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration under contract DE-NA0003525.
Disclaimer: Opinions expressed are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer, the U.S. Department of Energy, or the United States Government.
@article{pathakarxiv2024, title={Globally Hyperbolic AdS$_3$ and its Holography }, author={Pathak, Shivesh and Kovalsky, Lucas K}, journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2404.12546}, year={2024} }
@article{kovalskyarxiv2023_2, title={AdS$_3$ Vacuum State from Four Minkowski Vacuum States }, author={Kovalsky, Lucas K}, journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2309.15107}, year={2023} }
@article{kovalskyprl23, title={Self-Healing of Trotter Error in Digital Adiabatic State Preparation},author={Kovalsky, Lucas K and Calderon-Vargas, Fernando A and Grace, Matthew D and Magann, Alicia B and Larsen, James B and Baczewski, Andrew D and Sarovar, Mohan}, journal={Physical Review Letters}, volume={131}, number={6}, pages={060602}, year={2023}, publisher={APS} }
@article{kovalskyarxiv2023, title={Octonions and Quantum Gravity through the Central Charge Anomaly}, author={Kovalsky, Lucas K}, journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2304.14830}, year={2023} }
@article{shaffer2023surrogate, title={Surrogate-based optimization for variational quantum algorithms}, author={Shaffer, Ryan and Kocia, Lucas and Sarovar, Mohan}, journal={Physical Review A}, volume={107}, number={3}, pages={032415}, year={2023}, publisher={APS} }
Lucas T. Brady, Lucas Kocia, Przemyslaw Bienias, Aniruddha Bapat, Yaroslav Kharkov, and Alexey V. Gorshkov. “Behavior of Analog Quantum Algorithms.” arXiv preprint arXiv:2107.01218 (2021).
@article{bradyarxiv21, title={Behavior of Analog Quantum Algorithms}, author={Brady, Lucas T and Kocia, Lucas and Bienias, Przemyslaw and Bapat, Aniruddha and Kharkov, Yaroslav and Gorshkov, Alexey V}, journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:2107.01218}, year={2021} }
@article{kociaquantum21, title={Stationary phase method in discrete wigner functions and classical simulation of quantum circuits}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Love, Peter}, journal={Quantum}, volume={5}, pages={494}, year={2021}, publisher={Verein zur F{\"o}rderung des Open Access Publizierens in den Quantenwissenschaften} }
@article{kociajphysa19, title={The non-disjoint ontic states of the Grassmann ontological model, transformation contextuality, and the single qubit stabilizer subtheory}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Love, Peter}, journal={Journal of Physics A: Mathematical and Theoretical}, year={2019}, publisher={IOP Publishing} }
@article{kociapra17_2, title={Discrete Wigner formalism for qubits and noncontextuality of Clifford gates on qubit stabilizer states}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Love, Peter}, journal={Physical Review A}, volume={96}, number={6}, pages={062134}, year={2017}, publisher={APS} }
@article{yangarxiv17, title={Graphene Terahertz Absorption}, author={Yang, Yuan and Kolesov, Grigory and Kocia, Lucas and Heller, Eric J}, journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:1705.06267}, year={2017} }
@article{yangnanolett17, title={Reassessing graphene absorption and emission spectroscopy}, author={Yang, Yuan and Kolesov, Grigory and Kocia, Lucas and Heller, Eric J}, journal={Nano letters}, volume={17}, number={10}, pages={6077--6082}, year={2017}, publisher={ACS Publications} }
@article{kociaentropy17, title={Discrete Wigner Function Derivation of the Aaronson--Gottesman Tableau Algorithm}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Huang, Yifei and Love, Peter}, journal={Entropy}, volume={19}, number={7}, pages={353}, year={2017}, publisher={Multidisciplinary Digital Publishing Institute} }
@article{kociapra17, title={Semiclassical formulation of the Gottesman-Knill theorem and universal quantum computation}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Huang, Yifei and Love, Peter}, journal={Physical Review A}, volume={96}, number={3}, pages={032331}, year={2017}, publisher={APS} }
@article{kociapre16, title={Semiclassical treatment of quantum propagation with nonlinear classical dynamics: A third-order thawed Gaussian approximation}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Klales, Anna}, journal={Physical Review E}, volume={94}, number={3}, pages={032211}, year={2016}, publisher={APS} }
Eric J. Heller, Yuan Yang, Lucas Kocia, Wei Chen, Shiang Fang, Mario Borunda, Efthimios Kaxiras. “Theory of Graphene Raman Spectroscopy.” ACS Nano 10 (2016): 2.
@article{helleracsnano16, title={Theory of graphene Raman scattering}, author={Heller, Eric J and Yang, Yuan and Kocia, Lucas and Chen, Wei and Fang, Shiang and Borunda, Mario and Kaxiras, Efthimios}, journal={ACS nano}, volume={10}, number={2}, pages={2803--2818}, year={2016}, publisher={ACS Publications} }
Lucas Kocia, and Eric J. Heller. “Directed HK propagator.” The Journal of Chemical Physics 143.12(2015): 124102.
@article{kociajchemphys15, title={Directed HK propagator}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Heller, Eric J}, journal={The Journal of chemical physics}, volume={143}, number={12}, pages={124102}, year={2015}, publisher={AIP Publishing} }
@article{kociaarxiv15, title={Asymptotic Equation for Zeros of Hermite Polynomials from the Holstein-Primakoff Representation}, author={Kocia, Lucas}, journal={arXiv preprint arXiv:1506.00541}, year={2015} }
@article{kociajchemphys14, title={Communication: HK propagator uniformized along a one-dimensional manifold in weakly anharmonic systems}, author = {Kocia,Lucas and Heller,Eric J. }, title = {Communication: HK propagator uniformized along a one-dimensional manifold in weakly anharmonic systems}, journal = {The Journal of Chemical Physics}, volume = {141}, number = {18}, pages = {181102}, year = {2014}, doi = {10.1063/1.4901301}, URL={https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4901301}, eprint={https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4901301} }
@article{kociajchemphys13, title={Generalized dephasing relation for fidelity and application as an efficient propagator}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Heller, Eric J}, journal={The Journal of chemical physics}, volume={139}, number={12}, pages={124110}, year={2013}, publisher={AIP} }
@article{kociachemphys13, title={Theoretical examination of picosecond phenol migration dynamics in phenylacetylene solution}, author={Kocia, Lucas and Young, Steve M and Kholod, Yana A and Fayer, Michael D and Gordon, Mark S and Rappe, Andrew M}, journal={Chemical Physics}, volume={422}, pages={175--183}, year={2013}, publisher={Elsevier} }
TQC Sydney, Australia 2018 ([Poster] “Measurement Contextuality and Planck’s Constant” & [Talk] “Stationary Phase Approximation in Discrete Wigner Functions and Transformation Contextuality” at Bartlett Group)
The thawed Gaussian approximation (TGA) applied to an initial coherent state evolving under an absolute value cubic potential.
TOTGA run in abs. value cubic potential
The third-order thawed Gaussian approximation (TGA) applied to an initial coherent state evolving under an absolute value cubic potential.
TGA run in phase space and autocorrelation
The same as the first but with additional perspectives illustrated of the phase space and autocorrelation.
TOTGA run in phase space and autocorrelation
The same as the second but with additional perspectives illustrated of the phase space and autocorrelation.
TGA run under a Morse potential
The thawed Gaussian approximation (TGA) applied to an initial coherent state evolving under a Morse potential.
Classical density under an oscillating Morse potential
An classical probabilty distribution corresponding to an initial Gaussian is evolving under an oscillating Morse potential. The red dots correspond to the final phase space coordinates of the "guiding centers" which can be used to reproduce the overlaps with Gaussians. The green dots correspond to their initial coordinates within the initial probability density.
The off-center thawed Gaussian approximation (OCTGA) applied to an initial (green) coherent state evolving under some anharmonic potential. The purple coherent state is guided by a trajectory close to the central trajectory of the initial (green) coherent state. The red coherent states are guided by the trajectories whose initial and final coordinates are given by the green and red dots respectively. Summed together, they aim to reproduce the autocorrelation of the initial (green) coherent state, which is produced by its (blue) time evolute's overlap with its (green) initial state. The guiding trajectories are taken from the evolving manifold shown by the blue line cutting through the (blue) evolving state.