Quantum sampling on a quantum annealer for large volumes in the strong coupling limit for gauge group U(3)

In our previous studies [1, 2], we confirmed that a quantum annealer can be used for importance sampling of gauge theories. In this paper, we extend the previous results to larger 2-dimensional and 4-dimensional lattices to generate ensembles for U(3) gauge theory in the strong coupling limit. We make use of the D-Wave quantum annealer to generate histograms for sub-lattices, and use the Metropolis-Hastings algorithm to determine thermodynamic observables and their dependence on the physical parameters on large volumes. We benchmark our results to those obtained from classical Monte Carlo simulations.