Stefano Bosco, Simon Geyer, Leon C. Camenzind, Rafael S. Eggli, Andreas Fuhrer, Richard J. Warburton, Dominik M. Zumbühl, J. Carlos Egues, Andreas V. Kuhlmann, Daniel Loss
The spin-orbit interaction in spin qubits enables spin-flip transitions, resulting in Rabi oscillations when an external microwave field is resonant with the qubit frequency. Here, we introduce an alternative driving mechanism of hole spin qubits, where a far-detuned oscillating field couples to the qubit phase. Phase driving at radio frequencies, orders of magnitude slower than the microwave qubit frequency, induces highly non-trivial spin dynamics, violating the Rabi resonance condition. By using a qubit integrated in a silicon fin field-effect transistor (Si FinFET), we demonstrate a controllable suppression of resonant Rabi oscillations, and their revivals at tunable sidebands. These sidebands enable alternative qubit control schemes using global fields and local far-detuned pulses, facilitating the design of dense large-scale qubit architectures with local qubit addressability. Phase driving also decouples Rabi oscillations from noise, an effect due to a gapped Floquet spectrum and can enable Floquet engineering high-fidelity gates in future quantum processors.
Recent experiments have demonstrated two-qubit fidelities above 99%, however, theoretically, the fidelity of CNOT operations is limited by off-resonant driving described by off-diagonal terms in the system Hamiltonian. Here we investigate these off-diagonal contributions and we propose a fidelity improvement of several orders of magnitude by using asymmetric driving. Therefore, we provide a description of an ac virtual gate based on a simple capacitance model which not only enables a high fidelity CNOT but also crosstalk reduction when scaling up spin qubit devices to larger arrays.
We study the manipulation of quantum entanglement by periodic external fields. As an entanglement measure we compute numerically the concurrence of two flux qubits coupled inductively and/or capacitively, both driven by a dc+ac magnetic flux. Also we find an analytical lower bound for the concurrence, where the dominant terms correspond to the concurrence in the Floquet states. We show that it is possible to create or destroy entanglement in a controlled way by tuning the system at or near multiphoton resonances. We find that when the driving term of the Hamiltonian does not commute with the q…
We study decoherence of a field-driven qubit in the presence of environmental noises. For a general qubit, we find that driving, whether on-resonance or off-resonance, alters the qubit decoherence rates (including dissipation and pure dephasing), allowing both blue and red sideband contributions from the reservoir. Depending on the noise spectral density, driving field detuning and driving field phase shift, the qubit decoherence rates could be either accelerated or reduced. We apply our general theory to the system of an electron spin qubit that is confined in a quantum dot and driven by an i…
We study the emission spectrum of a qubit under deep strong driving in the high-frequency dispersive regime when the driving frequency and strength exceed significantly the qubit transition frequency. Closed-form expressions for the steady-state first-order field correlation function and the multiphoton emission spectrum are obtained. The spectrum comprises a series of narrow delta-like lines that stem from coherent processes and Lorenzian peaks that result from the incoherent scattering of photons. The oscillating dependence of the widths of the emission lines on the driving strength is predi…
Surfaces enable useful functionalities for quantum systems, e.g. as interfaces to sensing targets, but often result in surface-induced decoherence where unpaired electron spins are common culprits. Here we show that the coherence time of a near-surface qubit is increased by coherent radio-frequency driving of surface electron spins, where we use a diamond nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center as a model qubit. This technique is complementary to other methods of suppressing decoherence, and importantly, requires no additional materials processing or control of the qubit. Further, by combining driving wi…
We derive the structure of the Landau-Zener-Stückelberg-Majorana (LZSM) interference pattern for a qubit that experiences quantum dissipation and is additionally subjected to time-periodic but otherwise general driving. A spin-boson Hamiltonian serves as model which we treat with a Bloch-Redfield master equation in Floquet basis. It predicts a peak structure that depends sensitively on the operator through which the qubit couples to the bath. The Fourier transforms of the LZSM patterns exhibit arc structures which reflect the shape of the driving. These features are captured by an effective ti…
The quantum levels population behavior of the two coupled flux qubits depending on the external driving field characteristics is studied. The explicit expressions for the multiphoton transition probabilities at an arbitrary control field amplitude is obtained for the case of small tunnel splitting energies. We describe the controllable features of their formation and thereby creating or destroying entanglement by system bias tuning on the direct inter-level transition and during the transition through intermediate states. We found a feature of the qubits population inverting that ends in the i…
Performing qubit gate operations as quickly as possible can be important to minimize the effects of decoherence. For resonant gates, this requires applying a strong ac drive. However, strong driving can present control challenges by causing leakage to levels that lie outside the qubit subspace. Strong driving can also present theoretical challenges because preferred tools such as the rotating wave approximation can break down, resulting in complex dynamics that are difficult to control. Here we analyze resonant $X$ rotations of a silicon quantum double dot hybrid qubit within a dressed-state f…
We introduce an approach to studying a driven qubit-oscillator system in the ultrastrong coupling regime, where the ratio $g/Ω$ between coupling strength and oscillator frequency approaches unity or goes beyond, and simultaneously for driving strengths much bigger than the qubit energy splitting (extreme driving). Both qubit-oscillator coupling and external driving lead to a dressing of the qubit tunneling matrix element of different nature: the former can be used to suppress selectively certain oscillator modes in the spectrum, while the latter can bring the qubit's dynamics to a standstill a…
We present an approximate analytical solution to the dynamic equation of two Ising-coupled qubits with oscillating classical control fields that are nonperpendicular to the static drift fields. This is a situation that has recently arisen in some solid-state experiments. With our solution we derive the analytical expressions for the local invariants as well as the local rotations needed to isolate a purely nonlocal gate. This determines the set of parameters that are required to generate any entangling gate. Moreover, we use our results to describe a recent experimental work on capacitively co…
Limitations of the $g$-tensor formalism of semiconductor spin qubits
ELTE Eötvös Loránd University（厄特沃什·罗兰大学）；Institute of Physics, Budapest University of Technology and Economics（布达佩斯技术与经济大学物理研究所）；HUN-REN-BME-BCE Quantum Technology Research Group（匈牙利研究网络-布达佩斯技术与经济大学-布达佩斯经济与商业学院量子技术研究组）
We study the recently discovered phenomena of sudden death of entanglement for a system of two qubits, each of them independently longitudinally damped by a reservoir and subjected to a continuous driving. We show that driving produces, in the interaction picture, an effective bath that has elements amounting to various extra sources of noise (transverse, thermal squeezed, thermal longitudinal). As a result, the time of sudden death decreases due to driving, which we verify as well by direct numerical calculation. We suggest that this phenomenon can be studied systematically using superconduct…
Coherent dynamics of a superconducting phase qubit is considered in the presence of both unitary evolution due to microwave driving and continuous non-unitary collapse due to negative-result measurement. In the case of a relatively weak driving, the qubit dynamics is dominated by the non-unitary evolution, and the qubit state tends to an asymptotically stable point on the Bloch sphere. This dynamics can be clearly distinguished from conventional decoherence by tracking the state purity and the measurement invariant (``murity''). When the microwave driving strength exceeds certain critical valu…
Semiconductor double quantum dot hybrid qubits are promising candidates for high-fidelity quantum computing. However, their performance is limited by charge noise, which is ubiquitous in solid-state devices, and phonon-induced dephasing. Here we explore methods for improving the quantum operations of a hybrid qubit, using strong microwave driving to enable gate operations that are much faster than decoherence processes. Using numerical simulations and a theoretical method based on a cumulant expansion, we analyze qubit dynamics in the presence of $1/f$ charge noise, which forms the dominant de…
We study the effect of external driving on the two level systems (TLSs) assumed to be a major obstacle in increasing the coherence time of solid state Josephson-junction qubits. We find, by use of a Bloch-Redfield approach, that external driving has two major effects on the TLS. The first is increased fluctuations between the two states of the TLS, the significance of this effect compared to thermal fluctuations depend on the energy splitting of the TLS compared to temperature. The second effect is a reduction in the intensity of the noise spectrum at low frequencies, and at the same time an i…
Scaling up spin qubit systems requires high-fidelity single-qubit and two-qubit gates. Gate fidelities exceeding $98\%$ were already demonstrated in silicon based single and double quantum dots, whereas for the realization of larger qubit arrays crosstalk effects on neighboring qubits must be taken into account. We analyze qubit fidelities impacted by crosstalk when performing single-qubit and two-qubit operations on neighbor qubits with a simple Heisenberg model. Furthermore we propose conditions for driving fields to robustly synchronize Rabi oscillations and avoid crosstalk effects. In our …
We demonstrate how non-Abelian geometric phases can be used to universally process a spin qubit in heavy hole quantum dots in the absence of magnetic fields. A time dependent electric quadrupole field is used to perform any desired single qubit operation by virtue of non-Abelian holonomy. During the proposed operations, the degeneracy of the time dependent two level system representing the qubit is not split. Since time reversal symmetry is preserved and hyperfine coupling is known to be weak in spin qubits based on heavy holes, we expect very long coherence times in the proposed setup.
In this work we present a model qubit whose basis states are eigenstates of a multi-layered quantum dot. We show that the proper design of the quantum dot results in qubit states that have excellent dynamical properties when a time-dependent driving is applied to it. In particular, it is shown that a simple sinusoidal driving is sufficient to obtain good quality Rabi oscillations between the qubit states. Moreover, the switching between states can be performed with very low leakage, even under off-resonance conditions. In this sense, the quantum control of the qubit is robust under some pertur…
Hole-spin qubits in germanium beyond the single-particle regime
CNR-Istituto Nanoscienze（意大利国家研究委员会纳米科学研究所）；Università di Milano（米兰大学）；Università degli Studi di Modena e Reggio Emilia（摩德纳和雷焦艾米利亚大学）；University of Basel（巴塞尔大学）；King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals（法赫德国王石油与矿产大学）；Delft University of Technology（代尔夫特理工大学）
We present a scalable hybrid architecture for the 2D surface code combining superconducting resonators and hole-spin qubits in nanowires with tunable direct Rashba spin-orbit coupling. The back-bone of this architecture is a square lattice of capacitively coupled coplanar waveguide resonators each of which hosts a nanowire hole-spin qubit. Both the frequency of the qubits and their coupling to the microwave field are tunable by a static electric field applied via the resonator center pin. In the dispersive regime, an entangling two-qubit gate can be realized via a third order process, whereby …
Hole spin qubits are frontrunner platforms for scalable quantum computers because of their large spin-orbit interaction which enables ultrafast all-electric qubit control at low power. The fastest spin qubits to date are defined in long quantum dots with two tight confinement directions, when the driving field is aligned to the smooth direction. However, in these systems the lifetime of the qubit is strongly limited by charge noise, a major issue in hole qubits. We propose here a different, scalable qubit design, compatible with planar CMOS technology, where the hole is confined in a curved ge…
A key challenge in quantum computation is the implementation of fast and local qubit control while simultaneously maintaining coherence. Qubits based on hole spins offer, through their strong spin-orbit interaction, a way to implement fast quantum gates. Strikingly, for hole spins in one-dimensional germanium and silicon devices, the spin-orbit interaction has been predicted to be exceptionally strong yet highly tunable with gate voltages. Such electrical control would make it possible to switch on demand between qubit idling and manipulation modes. Here, we demonstrate ultrafast and universal…
We study the influence of a thermal environment on a non-adiabatic spin-flip driving protocol of spin-orbit qubits. The driving protocol operates by moving the qubit, trapped in a harmonic potential, along a nanowire in the presence of a time-dependent spin-orbit interaction. We consider the harmonic degrees of freedom to be weakly coupled to a thermal bath. We find an analytical expression for the Floquet states and derive the Lindblad equation for a strongly non-adiabatically driven qubit. The Lindblad equation corrects the dynamics of an isolated qubit with Lamb shift terms and a dissipativ…
In this work we introduce the many-body synchronization of an interacting qubit ensemble which allows one to switch dynamically from many-body-localized (MBL) to an ergodic state. We show that applying of $π$-pulses with altering phases, one can effectively suppress the MBL phase and, hence, eliminate qubits disorder. The findings are based on the analysis of the Loschmidt echo dynamics which shows a transition from a power-law decay to more rapid one indicating the dynamical MBL-to-ergodic transition. The technique does not require to know the microscopic details of the disorder.
Spin qubits are considered to be among the most promising candidates for building a quantum processor. GroupIV hole spin qubits have moved into the focus of interest due to the ease of operation and compatibility with Si technology. In addition, Ge offers the option for monolithic superconductor-semiconductor integration. Here we demonstrate a hole spin qubit operating at fields below 10 mT, the critical field of Al, by exploiting the large out-of-plane hole g-factors in planar Ge and by encoding the qubit into the singlet-triplet states of a double quantum dot. We observe electrically control…
We study the dynamics of a qubit-resonator system, when the resonator is driven by two signals. The interaction of the qubit with the high-amplitude driving we consider in terms of the qubit dressed states. Interaction of the dressed qubit with the second probing signal can essentially change the amplitude of this signal. We calculate the transmission amplitude of the probe signal through the resonator as a function of the qubit's energy and the driving frequency detuning. The regions of increase and attenuation of the transmitted signal are calculated and demonstrated graphically. We present …
In recent years, hole-spin qubits based on semiconductor quantum dots have advanced at a rapid pace. We first review the main potential advantages of these hole-spin qubits with respect to their electron-spin counterparts, and give a general theoretical framework describing them. The basic features of spin-orbit coupling and hyperfine interaction in the valence band are discussed, together with consequences on coherence and spin manipulation. In the second part of the article we provide a survey of experimental realizations, which spans a relatively broad spectrum of devices based on GaAs, Si,…
Hole spin qubits in planar Ge heterostructures are one of the frontrunner platforms for scalable quantum computers. In these systems, the spin-orbit interactions permit efficient all-electric qubit control. We propose a minimal design modification of planar devices that enhances these interactions by orders of magnitude and enables low power ultrafast qubit operations in the GHz range. Our approach is based on an asymmetric potential that strongly squeezes the quantum dot in one direction. This confinement-induced spin-orbit interaction does not rely on microscopic details of the device such a…
Hole spin qubits are frontrunner platforms for scalable quantum computers, but state-of-the-art devices suffer from noise originating from the hyperfine interactions with nuclear defects. We show that these interactions have a highly tunable anisotropy that is controlled by device design and external electric fields. This tunability enables sweet spots where the hyperfine noise is suppressed by an order of magnitude and is comparable to isotopically purified materials. We identify surprisingly simple designs where the qubits are highly coherent and are largely unaffected by both charge and hyp…
We demonstrate coherent driving of a single electron spin using second harmonic excitation in a Si/SiGe quantum dot. Our estimates suggest that the anharmonic dot confining potential combined with a gradient in the transverse magnetic field dominates the second harmonic response. As expected, the Rabi frequency depends quadratically on the driving amplitude and the periodicity with respect to the phase of the drive is twice that of the fundamental harmonic. The maximum Rabi frequency observed for the second harmonic is just a factor of two lower than that achieved for the first harmonic when d…
Flopping mode qubits in double quantum dots (DQDs) allow for coherent spin-photon hybridization and fast qubit gates when coupled to either an alternating external or a quantized cavity electric field. To achieve this, however, electronic systems rely on synthetic spin-orbit interaction (SOI) by means of a magnetic field gradient as a coupling mechanism. Here we theoretically show that this challenging experimental setup can be avoided in heavy-hole (HH) systems in germanium (Ge) by utilizing the sizeable cubic Rashba SOI. We argue that the resulting natural flopping mode qubit possesses highl…
Future communication and computation technologies that exploit quantum information require robust and well-isolated qubits. Electron spins in III-V semiconductor quantum dots, while promising candidates, see their dynamics limited by undesirable hysteresis and decohering effects of the nuclear spin bath. Replacing electrons with holes should suppress the hyperfine interaction and consequently eliminate strong nuclear effects. Using picosecond optical pulses, we demonstrate coherent control of a single hole qubit and examine both free-induction and spin-echo decay. In moving from electrons to h…
The pseudospin of heavy-holes (HHs) confined in a semiconductor quantum dot (QD) represents a promising candidate for a fast and robust qubit. While hole spin manipulation by a classical electric field utilizing the Dresselhaus spin-orbit interaction (SOI) has been demonstrated, our work explores cavity-based qubit manipulation and coupling schemes for inversion-symmetric crystals forming a planar HH QD. Choosing the exemplary material Germanium (Ge), we derive an effective cavity-mediated ground state spin coupling that harnesses the cubic Rashba SOI. In addition, we propose an optimal set of…
The feasibility of high-fidelity single-qubit operations of a hole spin in a quantum dot molecule by electric g tensor control is demonstrated. Apart from a constant external magnetic field the proposed scheme allows for an exclusively electric control of the hole spin. Realistic electric gate bias profiles are identified for various qubit operations using process-tomography-based optimal control. They are shown to be remarkably robust against decoherence and dissipation arising from the interaction of the hole with host-lattice nuclear spins and phonons, with a fidelity loss of $\approx$ 1 pe…
Operation speed and coherence time are two core measures for the viability of a qubit. Strong spin-orbit interaction (SOI) and relatively weak hyperfine interaction make holes in germanium (Ge) intriguing candidates for spin qubits with rapid, all-electrical coherent control. Here we report ultrafast single-spin manipulation in a hole-based double quantum dot in a germanium hut wire (GHW). Mediated by the strong SOI, a Rabi frequency exceeding 540 MHz is observed at a magnetic field of 100 mT, setting a record for ultrafast spin qubit control in semiconductor systems. We demonstrate that the s…
Hole spins in semiconductor quantum dots represent a viable route for the implementation of electrically controlled qubits. In particular, the qubit implementation based on Si pMOSFETs offers great potentialities in terms of integration with the control electronics and long-term scalability. Moreover, the future down scaling of these devices will possibly improve the performance of both the classical (control) and quantum components of such monolithically integrated circuits. Here we use a multi-scale approach to simulate a hole-spin qubit in a down scaled Si-channel pMOSFET, whose structure i…
The greatest challenge in achieving the high level of control needed for future technologies based on coherent quantum systems is the decoherence induced by the environment. Here, we present an analytical approach that yields explicit constraints on the driving field which are necessary and sufficient to ensure that the leading-order noise-induced errors in a qubit's evolution cancel exactly. We derive constraints for two of the most common types of noise that arise in qubits: slow fluctuations of the qubit energy splitting and fluctuations in the driving field itself. By theoretically recasti…
The greatest challenge in quantum computing is achieving scalability. Classical computing previously faced a scalability issue, solved with silicon chips hosting billions of fin field-effect transistors (FinFETs). These FinFET devices are small enough for quantum applications: at low temperatures, an electron or hole trapped under the gate serves as a spin qubit. Such an approach potentially allows the quantum hardware and its classical control electronics to be integrated on the same chip. However, this requires qubit operation at temperatures above 1K, where the cooling overcomes heat dissip…
We present a readout method for superconducting flux qubits. The qubit quantum flux state can be measured by determining the Josephson inductance of an inductively coupled DC superconducting quantum interference device (DC-SQUID). We determine the response function of the DC-SQUID and its back-action on the qubit during measurement. Due to driving, the qubit energy relaxation rate depends on the spectral density of the measurement circuit noise at sum and difference frequencies of the qubit Larmor frequency and SQUID driving frequency. The qubit dephasing rate is proportional to the spectral d…
In this paper, several nanodevices which realize basic single heavy hole qubit operations are proposed and supported by time dependent self consistent Poisson-Schrödinger calculations using a four band heavy hole-light hole model. In particular we propose a set of nanodevices which can act as Pauli X, Y, Z quantum gates and as a gate that acts similar as a Hadamard gate (i.e. it creates a balanced superposition of basis states but with an additional phase factor) on the heavy hole spin qubit. We also present the design and simulation of a gated semiconductor nanodevice which can realize an arb…
We demonstrate an on-demand hole spin qubit initialization scheme meeting four key requirements of quantum information processing: fast initialization (1/e ~ 100 ps), high fidelity (F > 99%), long qubit lifetime $(2T_{1}>T_{2}^{*}\simeq10\:\mathrm{ns})$, and compatibility with optical coherent control schemes. This is achieved by rapidly ionizing an exciton in an InGaAs quantum dot with very low fine-structure splitting at zero magnetic field. Furthermore, we show that the hole spin fidelity of an arbitrary quantum dot can be increased by optical Stark effect tuning of the fine-structure split…
We theoretically analyze a system where two electrons are trapped separately in two quantum dots on a suspended carbon nanotube (CNT), subject to external ac electric driving. An indirect mechanically-induced coupling of two distant single electron spins is induced by the interaction between the spins and the mechanical motion of the CNT. We show that a two-qubit iSWAP gate and arbitrary single-qubit gates can be obtained from the intrinsic spin-orbit coupling. Combining the iSWAP gate and single-qubit gates, maximally entangled states of two spins can be generated in a single step by varying …
