Studying viral populations with tools from quantum spin chains

Saumya Shivam, Christopher L. Baldwin, John Barton, Mehran Kardar, S. L. Sondhi

Published 2020-03-24Version 1

We study Eigen's model of quasi-species, characterized by sequences that replicate with a specified fitness and mutate independently at single sites. The evolution of the population vector in time is then closely related to that of quantum spins in imaginary time. We employ multiple perspectives and tools from interacting quantum systems to examine growth and collapse of realistic viral populations, specifically certain HIV proteins. All approaches used, including the simplest perturbation theory, give consistent results.