Generalization of Euler's Summation Formula to Path Integrals

Abstract

A recently developed analytical method for systematic improvement of the convergence of path integrals is used to derive a generalization of Euler's summation formula for path integrals. The first $p$ terms in this formula improve convergence of path integrals to the continuum limit from 1/N to $1/N^p$, where $N$ is the coarseness of the discretization. Monte Carlo simulations performed on several different models show that the analytically derived speedup holds.