Quantum chromodynamics (QCD) describes the structure of hadrons such as the proton at a fundamental level. The precision of calculations in QCD limits the precision of the values of many physical parameters extracted from collider data. For example, uncertainty in the parton distribution function is the dominant source of error in the $W$ mass measurement at the Large Hadron Collider. Improving the precision of such measurements is essential in the search for new physics. Quantum simulation offers an efficient way of studying quantum field theories (QFTs) such as QCD nonperturbatively. Previous quantum algorithms for simulating QFTs have qubit requirements that are well beyond the most ambitious experimental proposals for large-scale quantum computers. Can the qubit requirements for such algorithms be brought into range of quantum computation with several thousand logical qubits? We show how this can be achieved by using the light-front formulation of quantum field theory. This work was inspired by the similarity of the light-front formulation to quantum chemistry, first noted by Wilson [ Nucl. Phys. B, Proc. Suppl. 17, 82 (1990)].

We present a physically motivated parametrization of the chiral-even generalized parton distributions in the nonsinglet sector obtained from a global analysis using a set of available experimental data. Our analysis is valid in the kinematical region of intermediate Bjorken $x$ and for $Q^2$ in the multi-GeV region which is accessible at present and currently planned facilities. Relevant data included in our fit are from the nucleon elastic form factor measurements and from deep inelastic scattering experiments. Additional information provided by lattice calculations of the higher moments of generalized parton distributions is also considered. Recently extracted observables from deeply virtual Compton scattering on the nucleon are reproduced by our fit.

We present a quantum algorithm for simulation of quantum field theory in the light-front formulation and demonstrate how existing quantum devices can be used to study the structure of bound states in relativistic nuclear physics. Specifically, we apply the Variational Quantum Eigensolver algorithm to find the ground state of the light-front Hamiltonian obtained within the Basis Light-Front Quantization (BLFQ) framework. The BLFQ formulation of quantum field theory allows one to readily import techniques developed for digital quantum simulation of quantum chemistry. This provides a method that can be scaled up to simulation of full, relativistic quantum field theories in the quantum advantage regime. As an illustration, we calculate the mass, mass radius, decay constant, electromagnetic form factor, and charge radius of the pion on the IBM Vigo chip. This is the first time that the light-front approach to quantum field theory has been used to enable simulation of a real physical system on a quantum computer.

Exclusive ${\pi }^o$ electroproduction from nucleons is suggested for extracting the tensor charge and other quantities related to transversity from experimental data. This process isolates C-parity odd and chiral-odd combinations of t-channel exchange quantum numbers. In a hadronic picture it connects the meson production amplitudes to C-odd Regge exchanges with final state interactions. In a description based on partonic degrees of freedom, the helicity structure for this C-odd process relates to the quark helicity flip, or chiral-odd generalized parton distributions. This differs markedly from deeply virtual Compton scattering, and both vector meson and charged $\pi$ electroproduction, where the axial charge can enter the amplitudes. Contrarily, the tensor charge enters the ${\pi }^o$ process. The connection through the helicity description of the process to both the partonic and hadronic perspectives is studied and exploited in model calculations to indicate how the tensor charge and other transversity parameters can be related to cross section and spin asymmetry measurements over a broad range of kinematics.

We give an interpretation of the $u$ and $d$ quarks contributions to the nucleon electromagnetic form factors for values of the four-momentum transfer in the multi-GeV region where flavor separated data have been recently made available. The data show, in particular, a suppression of $d$ quarks with respect to $u$ quarks at large momentum transfer. This trend can be explained using a reggeized diquark model calculation of generalized parton distributions, thus providing a correlation between momentum and coordinate spaces, both of which are necessary to interpret the partonic substructure of the form factors. We extend our discussion to the second moments of generalized parton distributions which are believed to contribute to partonic angular momentum.

We provide the general expression of the cross section for exclusive deeply virtual photon electroproduction from a spin-$1/2$ target using current parametrizations of the off-forward correlation function in a nucleon for different beam and target polarization configurations up to twist-three accuracy. All contributions to the cross section including deeply virtual Compton scattering, the Bethe-Heitler process, and their interference, are described within a helicity-amplitude-based framework which is also relativistically covariant and readily applicable to both the laboratory frame and in a collider kinematic setting. Our formalism renders a clear physical interpretation of the various components of the cross section by making a connection with the known characteristic structure of the electron scattering coincidence reactions. In particular, we focus on the total angular momentum, $J_z$, and on the orbital angular momentum, $L_z$. On one side, we uncover an avenue to a precise extraction of $J_z$, given by the combination of generalized parton distributions, $H+E$, through a generalization of the Rosenbluth separation method used in elastic electron proton scattering. On the other side, we single out for the first time, the twist-three angular modulations of the cross section that are sensitive to $L_z$. The proposed generalized Rosenbluth technique adds constraints and can be extended to additional observables relevant to the mapping of the three-dimensional structure of the nucleon.