The spatial modes of light, carrying a quantized amount of orbital angular momentum (OAM), is one of the excellent candidates that provides access to high-dimensional quantum states, which essentially makes it promising towards building high-dimensional quantum networks. In this paper, we report the storage and retrieval of photonic qubits encoded with OAM state in the cold atomic ensemble, achieving an average conditional fidelity above 98% and retrieval efficiency around 65%. The photonic OAM qubits are encoded with weak coherent states at the single-photon level and the memory is based on electromagnetically induced transparency in an elongated cold rubidium atomic ensemble. Our work constitutes an efficient node that is needed towards high dimensional and large scale quantum networks.
We show how to construct a multi-qubit control gate on a quantum register of an arbitrary size N. This gate performs a single-qubit operation on a specific qubit conditioned by the state of other N-1 qubits. We provide an algorithm how to build up an array of networks consisting of single-qubit rotations and multi-qubit control-NOT gates for the synthesis of an arbitrary entangled quantum state of N qubits. We illustrate the algorithm on a system of cold trapped ions. This example illuminates the efficiency of the direct implementation of the multi-qubit CNOT gate compared to its decomposition…
We propose a new fast scalable method for achieving a two-qubit entangling gate between arbitrary distant qubits in a network by exploiting dispersionless propagation in uniform chains. This is achieved dynamically by switching on a strong interaction between the qubits and a bus formed by a non-engineered chain of interacting qubits. The quality of the gate scales very efficiently with qubit separations. Surprisingly, a sudden switching of the coupling is not necessary and our gate mechanism is not altered by a possibly gradual switching. The bus is also naturally reset to its initial state m…
We propose the use of Rydberg interactions and ensembles of cold atoms in mixed state for the implementation of a protocol for deterministic quantum computation with one quantum bit (DQC1) that can be readily operated in high dimensional Hilbert spaces. We propose an experimental test for the scalability of the protocol and to study the physics of discord. Furthermore we develop a scheme to add control to non-trivial unitaries that will enable the study of many-body physics with ensembles in mixed states.
We report on the storage of orbital angular momentum of light in a cold ensemble of cesium atoms. We employ Bragg diffraction to retrieve the stored optical information impressed into the atomic coherence by the incident light fields. The stored information can be manipulated by an applied magnetic field and we were able to observe collapses and revivals due to the rotation of the stored atomic Zeeman coherence for times longer than 15 $μs$.
Conventional superconducting qubits have used Josephson junctions as an essential part to provide anharmonicity for well-separated energy-level spacings. However, because a superconducting ring without Josephson junctions has intrinsically well-separated energy-level spacings, Josephson junctions are not necessary as long as one can achieve single-qubit operations. We show that the orbital angular momentum of light can be adopted as a qubit-control means and can eliminate the need for Josephson junctions. The feasibility study reveals that the proposed qubit has many advantages over the previo…
Quantum memory for flying optical qubits is a key enabler for a wide range of applications in quantum information science and technology. A critical figure of merit is the overall storage-and-retrieval efficiency. So far, despite the recent achievements of efficient memories for light pulses, the storage of qubits has suffered from limited efficiency. Here we report on a quantum memory for polarization qubits that combines an average conditional fidelity above 99% and an efficiency equal to (68$\pm$ 2)%, thereby demonstrating a reversible qubit mapping where more information is retrieved than …
We study the entanglement evolution of photonic orbital angular momentum qubit states with opposite azimuthal indices $l_0$, in a weakly turbulent atmosphere. Using asymptotic methods, we deduce analytical expressions for the amplitude of turbulence-induced crosstalk between the modes $l_0$ and $-l_0$. Furthermore, we analytically establish distinct, universal entanglement decay laws for Kolmogorov's turbulence model and for two approximations thereof.
We discuss a laser-trapped cold-atom superfluid qubit system. Each qubit is proposed as a macroscopic two-state system based on a set of Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) currents circulating in a ring, cut with a Josephson barrier. We review the effective low energy description of a single BEC ring. In particular, it is demonstrated that such system has a set of metastable current states which, for certain range of parameters, form an effective two-state system, or a qubit. We show how this qubit can be initialized and manipulated with currently available laser-trapping techniques. We also discu…
The orbital angular momentum of light (OAM) provides a promising approach for the implementation of multidimensional states (qudits) for quantum information purposes. In order to characterize the degradation undergone by the information content of qubits encoded in a bidimensional subspace of the orbital angular momentum degree of freedom of photons, we study how the state fidelity is affected by a transverse obstruction placed along the propagation direction of the light beam. Emphasis is placed on the effects of planar and radial hard-edged aperture functions on the state fidelity of Laguerr…
We investigate the decay properties of the quantumness including quantum entanglement, quantum discord and quantum coherence for two photonic qubits, which are partially entangled in their orbital angular momenta, through Kolmogorov turbulent atmosphere. It is found that the decay of quantum coherence and quantum discord may be qualitatively different from that of quantum entanglement when the initial state of two photons is not maximally entangled. We also derive two universal decay laws for quantum coherence and quantum discord, respectively, and show that the decay of quantum coherence is m…
We study the physical implementation of an optimal tomographic reconstruction scheme for the case of determining the state of a multi-qubit system, where trapped ions are used for defining qubits. The protocol is based on the use of mutually unbiased measurements and on the physical information described in H. Häffner \emph{et. al} [Nature \textbf{438}, 643-646 (2005)]. We introduce the concept of physical complexity for different types of unbiased measurements and analyze their generation in terms of one and two qubit gates for trapped ions.
Recently, atomic ensemble and single photons were successfully entangled by using collective enhancement [D. N. Matsukevich, \textit{et al.}, Phys. Rev. Lett. \textbf{95}, 040405(2005).], where atomic internal states and photonic polarization states were correlated in nonlocal manner. Here we experimentally clarified that in an ensemble of atoms and a photon system, there also exists an entanglement concerned with spatial degrees of freedom. Generation of higher-dimensional entanglement between remote atomic ensemble and an application to condensed matter physics are also discussed.
We investigate the behaviour of a single qubit coupled to a low-dimensional, ultra-cold Fermi gas. The scattering between the system and the fermions leads to the loss of any coherence in the initial state of the qubit and we show that the exact dynamics of this process is strongly influenced by the effect of the orthogonality catastrophe within the gas. We highlight the relationship between the Loschmidt echo and the retarded Green's function - typically used to formulate the dynamical theory of the catastrophe - and demonstrate that the effect can be triggered and characterized via local ope…
We propose a simple scheme for implementing quantum logic gates with a string of two-level trapped cold ions outside the Lamb-Dicke limit. Two internal states of each ion are used as one computational qubit (CQ) and the collective vibration of ions acts as the information bus, i.e., bus qubit (BQ). Using the quantum dynamics for the laser-ion interaction as described by a generalized Jaynes-Cummings model, we show that quantum entanglement between any one CQ and the BQ can be coherently manipulated by applying classical laser beams. As a result, universal quantum gates, i.e. the one-qubit rota…
We propose to use a few-qubit system as a compact quantum refrigerator for cooling an interacting multi-qubit system. We specifically consider a central qubit coupled to $N$ ancilla qubits in a so-called spin-star model as our quantum refrigerator. We first show that if the interaction between the qubits is of the longitudinal and ferromagnetic Ising model form, the central qubit is colder than the environment. The colder central qubit is then proposed to be used as the refrigerant interface of the quantum refrigerator to cool down general quantum many-qubit systems. We discuss a simple refrig…
In this paper we present a hybrid scheme for topological quantum computation in a system of cold atoms trapped in an atomic lattice. A topological qubit subspace is defined using Majorana fermions which emerge in a network of atomic Kitaev one-dimensional wires. We show how braiding can be efficiently implemented in this setup and propose a direct way to demonstrate the non-Abelian nature of Majorana fermions via a single parity measurement. We then introduce a proposal for the efficient, robust and reversible mapping of the topological qubits to a conventional qubit stored in a single atom. T…
The Einstein Podolsky Rosen (EPR) entangled quantum state is of special importance not only for fundamental research in quantum mechanics, but also for information processing in the field of quantum information. Previous EPR entangled state demonstrations were constructed with photons of equal phase wave fronts. More complex scenarios with structured wave fronts have not been investigated. Here, we report the first experimental demonstration of EPR entanglement for photon pairs carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) information, resulting in an OAM embedded EPR entangled state. We measured th…
We propose two quantum error correction schemes which increase the maximum storage time for qubits in a system of cold trapped ions, using a minimal number of ancillary qubits. Both schemes consider only the errors introduced by the decoherence due to spontaneous emission from the upper levels of the ions. Continuous monitoring of the ion fluorescence is used in conjunction with selective coherent feedback to eliminate these errors immediately following spontaneous emission events, and the conditional time evolution between quantum jumps is removed by symmetrizing the quantum codewords.
We discuss the implementation of quantum gate operations in a self-assembled dipolar crystal of polar molecules. Here qubits are encoded in long-lived spin states of the molecular ground state and stabilized against collisions by repulsive dipole-dipole interactions. To overcome the single site addressability problem in this high density crystalline phase, we describe a new approach for implementing controlled single and two-qubit operations based on resonantly enhanced spin-spin interactions mediated by a localized phonon mode. This local mode is created at a specified lattice position with t…
In this tutorial we review the basic building blocks of Quantum Information Processing with cold trapped atomic-ions. We mainly focus on methods to implement single-qubit rotations and two-qubit entangling gates, which form a universal set of quantum gates. Different ion qubit choices and their respective gate implementations are described.
In this work we experimentally implement a deterministic transfer of a generic qubit initially encoded in the orbital angular momentum of a single photon to its polarization. Such transfer of quantum information, completely reversible, has been implemented adopting a electrically tunable q-plate device and a Sagnac interferomenter with a Dove's prism. The adopted scheme exhibits a high fidelity and low losses.
In this tutorial we review physical implementation of quantum computing using a system of cold trapped ions. We discuss systematically all the aspects for making the implementation possible. Firstly, we go through the loading and confining of atomic ions in the linear Paul trap, then we describe the collective vibrational motion of trapped ions. Further, we discuss interactions of the ions with a laser beam. We treat the interactions in the travelling-wave and standing-wave configuration for dipole and quadrupole transitions. We review different types of laser cooling techniques associated wit…
We consider a two reservoir model of quantum error correction with a hot bath causing errors in the qubits and a cold bath cooling the ancilla qubits to a fiducial state. We consider error correction protocols both with and without measurement of the ancilla state. The error correction acts as a kind of refrigeration process to maintain the data qubits in a low entropy state by periodically moving the entropy to the ancilla qubits and then to the cold reservoir. We quantify the performance of the error correction as a function of the reservoir temperatures and cooling rate by means of the fide…
We develop a valley-dependent envelope function theory that can describe the effects of arbitrary configurations of interface steps and miscuts on the qubit relaxation time. For a given interface roughness, we show how our theory can be used to find the valley-dependent dipole matrix elements, the valley splitting, and the spin-valley coupling as a function of the electromagnetic fields in a Si/SiGe quantum dot spin qubit. We demonstrate that our theory can quantitatively reproduce and explain the result of experimental measurements for the spin relaxation time with only a minimal set of free …
We propose and demonstrate an atomic qubit based on a cold $^{85}$Rb-$^{87}$Rb isotopic mixture, entangled with a frequency-encoded optical qubit. The interface of an atomic qubit with a single spatial light mode, and the ability to independently address the two atomic qubit states, should provide the basic element of an interferometrically robust quantum network.
Among the optical degrees of freedom, the orbital angular momentum of light provides unique properties, including mechanical torque action with applications for light manipulation, enhanced sensitivity in imaging techniques and potential high-density information coding for optical communication systems. Recent years have also seen a tremendous interest in exploiting orbital angular momentum at the single-photon level in quantum information technologies. In this endeavor, here we demonstrate the implementation of a quantum memory for quantum bits encoded in this optical degree of freedom. We ge…
Quantum computing has been attracting tremendous efforts in recent years. One prominent application is to perform quantum simulations of electron correlations in large molecules and solid-state materials, where orbital degrees of freedom are crucial to quantitatively model electronic properties. Electron orbitals unlike quantum spins obey crystal symmetries, making the atomic orbital in optical lattices a natural candidate to emulate electron orbitals. Here, we construct atom-orbital qubits by manipulating $s$- and $d$-orbitals of atomic Bose-Einstein condensation in an optical lattice. Noise-…
Small quantum absorption refrigerators have recently attracted renewed attention. Here we present a missing design of a two-qubit fridge, the main feature of which is that one of the two machine qubits is itself maintained at a temperature colder than the cold bath. This is achieved by 'reversing' the couplings to the baths compared to previous designs, where only a transition is maintained cold. We characterize the working regime and the efficiency of the fridge. We demonstrate the soundness of the model by deriving and solving a master equation. Finally, we discuss the performance of the fri…
While measuring the orbital angular momentum state of bright light beams can be performed using imaging techniques, a full characterization at the single-photon level is challenging. For applications to quantum optics and quantum information science, such characterization is an essential capability. Here, we present a setup to perform the quantum state tomography of photonic qubits encoded in this degree of freedom. The method is based on a projective technique using spatial mode projection via fork holograms and single-mode fibers inserted into an interferometer. The alignment and calibration…
Orbital modeling of two electron spins confined in a double quantum dot is revisited. We develop an extended Hund Mulliken approach that includes excited orbitals, allowing for a triplet configuration with both electrons residing in a single dot. This model improves the reliability and applicability of the standard Hund Mulliken approximation, while remaining largely analytical, thus it enables us to identify the mechanisms behind the exchange coupling dynamics that we find. In particular, our calculations are in close agreement with exchange values that were recently measured at a high interd…
So far experimental confirmation of entanglement has been restricted to qubits, i.e. two-state quantum systems including recent realization of three- and four-qubit entanglements. Yet, an ever increasing body of theoretical work calls for entanglement in quantum system of higher dimensions. Here we report the first realization of multi-dimensional entanglement exploiting the orbital angular momentum of photons, which are states of the electromagnetic field with phase singularities (doughnut modes). The properties of such states could be of importance for the efforts in the field of quantum com…
A triple-quantum-dot system can be operated as either an exchange-only qubit or a resonant-exchange qubit. While it is generally believed that the decisive advantage of the resonant-exchange qubit is the suppression of charge noise because it is operated at a sweet spot, we show that the leakage is also an important factor. Through molecular-orbital-theoretic calculations, we show that when the system is operated in the exchange-only scheme, the leakage to states with double electron occupancy in quantum dots is severe when rotations around the axis 120$^\circ$ from $\hat{z}$ is performed. Whi…
Optical lattices with one atom on each site and interacting via cold controlled collisions provide an efficient way to entangle a large number of qubits with high fidelity. It has already been demonstrated experimentally that this approach is especially suited for the generation of cluster states [O. Mandel et al., Nature 425, 937 (2003)] which reduce the resource requirement for quantum computing to the ability to perform single-qubit rotations and qubit read out. In this paper, we describe how to implement these rotations in 1D and 2D optical lattices without having to address the atoms indi…
The orbital angular momentum, OAM, of photons offers a suitable support to carry the quantum data of multiple users. We present two novel optical setups that send the information of n quantum communication parties through the same free-space optical link. Those qubits can be sent simultaneously and share path, wavelength and polarization without interference, increasing the communication capacity of the system. The first solution, a qubit combiner, merges n channels into the same link, which transmits n independent photons. The second solution, the OAM multiplexer, uses CNOT gates to transfer …
We examine the possibility of coherent, reversible information transfer between solid-state superconducting qubits and ensembles of ultra-cold atoms. Strong coupling between these systems is mediated by a microwave transmission line resonator that interacts near-resonantly with the atoms via their optically excited Rydberg states. The solid-state qubits can then be used to implement rapid quantum logic gates, while collective metastable states of the atoms can be employed for long-term storage and optical read-out of quantum information.
Interfacing fundamentally different quantum systems is key to build future hybrid quantum networks. Such heterogeneous networks offer superior capabilities compared to their homogeneous counterparts as they merge individual advantages of disparate quantum nodes in a single network architecture. However, only very few investigations on optical hybrid-interconnections have been carried out due to the high fundamental and technological challenges, which involve e.g. wavelength and bandwidth matching of the interfacing photons. Here we report the first optical quantum interconnection between two d…
We propose a scheme to manipulate a topological spin qubit which is realized with cold atoms in a one-dimensional optical lattice. In particular, by introducing a quantum opto-electro-mechanical interface, we are able to first transfer a superconducting qubit state to an atomic qubit state and then to store it into the topological spin qubit. In this way, an efficient topological quantum memory could be constructed for the superconducting qubit. Therefore, we can consolidate the advantages of both the noise resistance of the topological qubits and the scalability of the superconducting qubits …
We propose a novel mechanism for creating a qubit based on a tight knot, that is a nano-quantum wire system so small and so cold as to be quantum coherent with respect to curvature-induced effects. To establish tight knots as legitimate candidates for qubits, we propose an effective curvature-induced potential that produces the two-level system and identify the tunnel coupling between the two local states. We propose also a different design of nano-mechanical qubit based on twisted nano-rods. We describe how both devices can be manipulated. Also we outline possible decoherence channels, detect…
Distinguishing hot from cold is the most primitive form of thermometry. Here we consider how well this task can be performed using a single qubit to distinguish between two different temperatures of a bosonic bath. In this simple setting, we find that letting the qubit equilibrate with the bath is not optimal, and depending on the interaction time it may be advantageous for the qubit to start in a state with some quantum coherence. We also briefly consider the case that the qubit is initially entangled with a second qubit that is not put into contact with the bath, and show that entanglement a…
We propose a scheme to perform basic gates of quantum computing and prepare entangled states in a system with cold trapped ions located in a single mode optical cavity. General quantum computing can be made with both motional state of the trapped ion and cavity state being qubits. We can also generate different kinds of entangled states in such a system without state reduction, and can transfer quantum states from the ion in one trap to the ion in another trap. Experimental requirement for achieving our scheme is discussed.
We propose a quantum storage scheme independent of the current time-control schemes, and study a "quantum data bus" (transmission line resonator) in a hybrid system consisting of a circuit QED system integrated with a cold molecular ensemble. Here, an effective interaction between charge qubit and molecule is mediated by the off-resonate field in the data bus. Correspondingly, the charge state can be mapped into the collective quasi-spin state of the molecular ensemble via the standard dark state based adiabatic manipulation.
It is shown that a two-qubit phase gate and SWAP operation between ground states of cold trapped ions can be realised in one step by simultaneously applying two laser fields. Cooling during gate operations is possible without perturbing the computation and the scheme does not require a second ion species for sympathetic cooling. On the contrary, the cooling lasers even stabilise the desired time evolution of the system. This affords gate operation times of nearly the same order of magnitude as the inverse coupling constant of the ions to a common vibrational mode.
The orbital angular momentum (OAM) of light, associated with a helical structure of the wavefunction, has a great potential for quantum photonics, as it allows attaching a higher dimensional quantum space to each photon. Hitherto, however, the use of OAM has been hindered by its difficult manipulation. Here, exploiting the recently demonstrated spin-OAM information transfer tools, we report the first observation of the Hong-Ou-Mandel coalescence of two incoming photons having nonzero OAM into the same outgoing mode of a beam-splitter. The coalescence can be switched on and off by varying the i…
We introduce a matter wave interference scheme based on the quantization of orbital angular momentum in a ring trap. It operates without beam splitters, is sensitive to geometric phases induced by external gauge fields, and allows measuring interatomic scattering lengths. We argue that orbital angular momentum interferometry offers a versatile platform for quantum coherent experiments with cold atoms and Bose-Einstein condensates using state-of-the-art technology.
We analyze Weyl algebra of quantum angular momentum system and construct qubit subalgebra out of it. We show that the commutant of this qubit subalgebra is isomorphic to the original algebra and prove the tensor product structure between qubit subalgebra and its commutant. This construction can be iterated to construct arbitrary number of qubit subalgebras from a single quantum system. We show a simple experimental realization of this proposed scheme using orbital angular momentum of single photons. We briefly discuss about construction of qudit subalgbra and generalization to other infinite d…
We report on the storage of orbital angu- lar momentum (OAM) of light of a Laguerre-Gaussian mode in an ensemble of cold cesium atoms and its re- trieval along an axis different from the incident light beam. We employed a time-delayed four-wave mixing configuration to demonstrate that at small angle (2o), after storage, the retrieved beam carries the same OAM as the one encoded in the input beam. A calculation based on mode decomposition of the retrieved beam over the Laguerre-Gaussian basis is in agreement with the experimental observations done at small angle values. However, the calculation…
Single spin measurement represents a major challenge for spin-based quantum computation. In this article we propose a new method for measuring the spin of a single electron confined in a quantum dot (QD). Our strategy is based on entangling (using unitary gates) the spin and orbital degrees of freedom. An {\em orbital qubit}, defined by a second, empty QD, is used as an ancilla and is prepared in a known initial state. Measuring the orbital qubit will reveal the state of the (unknown) initial spin qubit, hence reducing the problem to the easier task of single charge measurement. Since spin-cha…
Quantum simulations of molecular systems on quantum computers often employ minimal basis sets of Gaussian orbitals. In comparison with more realistic basis sets, quantum simulations employing minimal basis sets require fewer qubits and quantum gates, but yield results of lower accuracy. A natural strategy to achieve more accurate results is to increase the basis set size, which in turn requires increasing the number of qubits and quantum gates. Here we explore the use of intrinsic atomic orbitals (IAOs) in quantum simulations of molecules, to improve the accuracy of energies and properties at …
We show that by using cold controlled collisions between two atoms one can achieve conditional dynamics in moving trap potentials. We discuss implementing two qubit quantum--gates and efficient creation of highly entangled states of many atoms in optical lattices.
