Lattice Qcd for Novices

These lectures are for novices who are interested in learning how to do lattice QCD simulations. My intent is to describe in detail everything that one needs to know in order to create and run a simple lattice QCD simulation. My focus here is not on lengthy derivations or detailed comparisons of algorithms. Rather I want to introduce a set of simple ideas and techniques that one can implement in a relatively short time and that are capable of generating nontrivial results from lattice QCD. We begin in Section 2 with simple one-dimensional quantum mechanics. Most of the simulation techniques can be applied to ordinary quantum mechanics, and the simulations require only seconds or minutes of computer time, rather than the hours or days needed for QCD simulations. Consequently such applications are ideal for learning the simulation technology. We broaden the discussion to include quantum field theories in Section 3. Here we discuss the theoretical techniques needed to obtain accurate results on the relatively coarse lattices well suited to smaller computers. Finally, in Section 4, we adapt our techniques for simulations of gluon dynamics in QCD.