Strong CP problem in the quantum rotor

Recent studies have claimed that the strong CP problem does not occur in QCD, proposing a new order of limits in volume and topological sectors when studying observables on the lattice. In order to shed light on this issue, we study the effect of the topological theta-term on a simple quantum mechanical rotor that allows a lattice description. The topological susceptibility and the theta-dependence of the energy spectrum are both computed using local lattice correlation functions. The sign problem is overcome by considering Taylor expansions in theta, exploiting automatic differentiation methods for Monte Carlo processes. Our findings confirm the conventional wisdom on the strong CP problem.