I am a PhD student in Physics, but I am no expert in condensed matter physics (I do research in computational NMR). Based on my experience with theorists and simulation researcher, I am a bit concerned with anchoring bias and the speed at which simulation papers are being published here. Then again, I don't know exactly what kind of research steps they follow to do their research.
There’s an old saying that “simulations are bound to succeed,” but also as an academic that has a working knowledge of statistical mechanics but is not a (condensed matter) physicist, from what I’ve read it seems folks are approaching this with healthy skepticism likely due to the drama around the development and release of the first paper.
The simulation paper folks are talking about used what appeared to be an existing DFT simulation package. Now, DFT is an approximate theory used to render computation tractable, but to my understanding it is a popular and mature method. I was actually kind of impressed that they were able to reproduce results from the LK paper in simulation so quickly. While it’s possible the speed led to a bug or error in the analysis, simulations often don’t just magically work and can take a decent amount of parameter tuning — especially if the system being simulated has something tricky or exotic going on. The fact that they were able to get what appears to be an accurate simulation working quickly that also justifies the low yield rates has made me more cautiously optimistic than anything
I don't know why anyone should be concerned about anything here, unless you want immediate confirmation.
It's a process. Scientists will try to replicate and try to simulate and try to reason theoretically. They are bound to make mistakes but all of this can be critiqued and iterated on.
Again, there's no problem unless you need immediate confirmation or you think chasing this idea is a waste of time.
