QUANTIC
Inria Paris, ENS – PSL and Mines Paris – PSL, Paris, France
- PIs
- Mazyar Mirrahimi, Alain Sarlette, Zaki Leghtas, Philippe Campagne-Ibarcq, Samuel Deléglise, Alexandru Petrescu, Rémi Robin, Antoine Tilloy
- Tracked papers
- 33 (2005–2026)
Topics
The most frequent field-map topics among the PIs' tracked papers.
- Feedback 17
- Superconducting 12
- Bosonic 10
- Photonics 9
- QEC 3
- Trapped ions 3
- Reservoir engineering 3
- Dynamical decoupling 2
Recent papers
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Protecting bosonic codes from ancilla-induced errors with continuous-variable flags
Abstract
Bosonic quantum error correction represents a route towards significant hardware overhead reduction for fault-tolerant quantum computation. However, controlling quantum harmonic oscillators that encode the quantum information comes with its own challenges. In many platforms such as superconducting circuits and trapped ions, the bosonic degree of freedom is controlled by an ancillary qubit whose decay during a qubit-oscillator gate propagates to the oscillator as a continuous error. Such errors generally lie beyond the scope of errors that the bosonic code is capable of correcting. We introduce the continuous-variable flag: an auxiliary oscillator coupled to the ancilla whose phase-space position encodes the continuous error corrupting the storage mode. After the gate, a heterodyne measurement of the flag estimates this continuous-variable error and a subsequent feedback control undoes it up to a bosonic code stabilizer. The scheme requires no new ingredients, as the flag is driven by the same dispersive coupling, displacements and rotations that implement the gates it is supposed to protect. We construct sequences protecting conditional rotations to all orders in ancilla decay with one flag, and conditional displacements to first order with one flag and to all orders with two. Simulations with realistic circuit-QED parameters predict more than three orders of magnitude fewer logical errors for the parity measurement of a four-component cat code, and a finite-energy GKP logical lifetime near its noiseless-ancilla bound. By discretizing continuous-variable errors, the flags introduced in this work are a useful tool for any hybrid oscillator-qubit processor, and open the route towards fault-tolerant simulation and computation with bosonic modes.
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Experimental realization of a $\cos(2\varphi)$ transmon qubit
Abstract
Superconducting circuits with embedded symmetries are good candidates to robustly protect quantum information from dominant error channels. The $\cos(2\varphi)$ qubit, consisting of an island shunted to ground through a tunneling element that selectively transmits pairs of Cooper pairs, leverages charge-parity symmetry to protect from charge-induced errors. In this experiment, we observe a doublet of states of opposite Cooper-pair parity split by $13.6~\mathrm{MHz}$. Operating in a soft-transmon regime, this splitting is two orders of magnitude smaller than in previous implementations, pushing charge-induced losses well beyond the measured coherence times. Despite the low transition frequency, we demonstrate coherent qubit control, single-shot readout, and resolve quantum jumps. Charge protection of the qubit is evidenced by a $100-$fold suppression of the island charge matrix element compared to the unprotected plasmon transition, placing dielectric loss limits above $10~\mathrm{ms}$. The measured $T_1 = 70~μ\mathrm{s}$ and $T_2^\mathrm{echo}= 2.5~μ\mathrm{s}$ are instead limited by $1/f$ flux noise in the tunnelling element's loop. This experiment shows that pushing Cooper-pair pairing in the transmon regime sets high limits on charge-induced losses while preserving coherent control and single-shot readout of the low-frequency qubit. We identify flux noise as the dominant remaining limitation, calling for gradiometric designs or novel $4e$-tunneling elements.
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Optimal schedule of multi-channel quantum Zeno dragging with application to solving the k-SAT problem
Abstract
Quantum Zeno dragging enables the preparation of common eigenstates of a set of observables by frequent measurement and adiabatic-like modulation of the measurement basis. In this work, we present a deeper analysis of multi-channel Zeno dragging using generalized measurements, i.e. simultaneously measuring a set of non-commuting observables that vary slowly in time, to drag the state towards a target subspace. For concreteness, we will focus on a measurement-driven approach to solving k-SAT problems as examples. We first compute some analytical upper bounds on the convergence time, including the effect of finite measurement time resolution. We then apply optimal control theory to obtain the optimal dragging schedule that lower bounds the convergence time, for low-dimensional settings. This study provides a theoretical foundation for multi-channel Zeno dragging and its optimization, and also serves as a guide for designing optimal dragging schedules for quantum information tasks including measurement-driven quantum algorithms.
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Probing the quantum motion of a macroscopic mechanical oscillator with a radio-frequency superconducting qubit
Abstract
Long-lived mechanical resonators like drums oscillating at MHz frequencies and operating in the quantum regime are a powerful platform for quantum technologies and tests of fundamental physics. Yet, quantum control of such systems remains challenging, owing to their low energy scale and the difficulty of achieving efficient coupling to other well-controlled quantum devices. Here, we demonstrate repeated coherent interactions between a 4 MHz suspended silicon nitride membrane and a resonant superconducting heavy-fluxonium qubit. The qubit is initialized at an effective temperature of $21~\mathrm{μK}$ and read out with 77% single-shot fidelity. During the $6~\mathrm{ms}$ lifetime of the membrane the two systems swap excitations more than 300 times. After each interaction, a state-selective qubit detection is performed, implementing a stroboscopic series of weak measurements that provide information about the mechanical state. The accumulated records reconstruct the position noise spectrum of the membrane, revealing both its thermal occupation $n_\mathrm{th}\approx47$ at $10~\mathrm{mK}$ and the qubit-induced back-action. By preparing the qubit either in its ground or excited state before each interaction, we observe an imbalance between the emission and absorption spectra, proportional to $n_\mathrm{th}$ and $n_\mathrm{th}+1$, respectively-a hallmark of the non-commutation of phonon creation and annihilation operators. Since the predicted Diósi-Penrose gravitational collapse time is comparable to the measured mechanical decoherence time, our architecture enters a regime where gravity-induced decoherence could be tested directly.
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General quantum-classical dynamics as measurement based feedback
Abstract
This note derives the stochastic differential equations and partial differential equation of general hybrid quantum--classical dynamics from the theory of continuous measurement and general (non-Markovian) feedback. The advantage of this approach is an explicit parameterization, without additional positivity constraints. The construction also neatly separates the different effects: how the quantum influences the classical and how the classical influences the quantum. This modular presentation gives a better intuition of what to expect from hybrid dynamics, especially when used to construct possibly fundamental theories.
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FPGA-based feedback control of quantum optics experiments with the open source software package PyRPL
Abstract
We present PyRPL, an open source software package that allows the implementation of automatic digital feedback controllers for quantum optics experiments on commercially available, affordable FPGA boards. Our software implements the digital generation of various types of error signals, from an analog input through the application of loop filters of high complexity and real-time gain adjustment for multiple analog output signals, including different algorithms for resonance search, lock acquisition sequences and in-loop gain optimization. Furthermore, all necessary diagnostic instruments such as an oscilloscope, a network analyzer and a spectrum analyzer are integrated into our software. Apart from providing a quickly scalable, automatic feedback controller, the lock performance that can be achieved by using PyRPL with imperfect equipment such as piezoelectric transducers and noisy amplifiers is better than the one achievable with standard analog controllers due to the higher complexity of implementable filters and possibilities of nonlinear operations in the FPGA. This drastically reduces the cost of added complexity when introducing additional feedback loops to an experiment. The open-source character also distinguishes PyRPL from commercial solutions, as it allows users to customize functionalities at various levels, ranging from the easy integration of PyRPL-based feedback controllers into existing setups to the modification of the FPGA functionality. A community of developers provides fast and efficient implementation and testing of software modifications.
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Quantum control of a cat-qubit with bit-flip times exceeding ten seconds
Abstract
Quantum bits (qubits) are prone to several types of errors due to uncontrolled interactions with their environment. Common strategies to correct these errors are based on architectures of qubits involving daunting hardware overheads. A hopeful path forward is to build qubits that are inherently protected against certain types of errors, so that the overhead required to correct remaining ones is significantly reduced. However, the foreseen benefit rests on a severe condition: quantum manipulations of the qubit must not break the protection that has been so carefully engineered. A recent qubit - the cat-qubit - is encoded in the manifold of metastable states of a quantum dynamical system, thereby acquiring continuous and autonomous protection against bit-flips. Here, in a superconducting circuit experiment, we implement a cat-qubit with bit-flip times exceeding 10 seconds. This is a four order of magnitude improvement over previous cat-qubit implementations. We prepare and image quantum superposition states, and measure phase-flip times above 490 nanoseconds. Most importantly, we control the phase of these quantum superpositions without breaking bit-flip protection. This experiment demonstrates the compatibility of quantum control and inherent bit-flip protection at an unprecedented level, showing the viability of these dynamical qubits for future quantum technologies.
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Chattering Phenomenon in Quantum Optimal Control
Abstract
We present a quantum optimal control problem which exhibits a chattering phenomenon. This is the first instance of such a process in quantum control. Using the Pontryagin Maximum Principle and a general procedure due to V. F. Borisov and M. I. Zelikin, we characterize the local optimal synthesis, which is then globalized by a suitable numerical algorithm. We illustrate the importance of detecting chattering phenomena because of their impact on the efficiency of numerical optimization procedures.
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Quantum dynamical decoupling by shaking the close environment
Abstract
Quantum dynamical decoupling is a procedure to cancel the effective coupling between two systems by applying sequences of fast actuations, under which the coupling Hamiltonian averages out to leading order(s). One of its prominent uses is to drive a target system in such a way as to decouple it from a less protected one. The present manuscript investigates the dual strategy: acting on a noisy "environment" subsystem such as to decouple it from a target system. The potential advantages are that actions on the environment commute with system operations, and that imprecisions in the decoupling actuation are harmless to the target. We consider two versions of environment-side decoupling: adding an imprecise Hamiltonian drive which stirs the environment components; and, increasing the decoherence rates on the environment. The latter can be viewed as driving the environment with pure noise and our conclusions establish how, maybe counterintuitively, isolating the environment from noise sources as much as possible is often not the best option. We explicitly analyze the induced decoherence on the target system and establish how it is influenced by the parameters in both cases. The analysis combines Lindbladian derivation, adiabatic elimination, and Floquet modeling in a way that may be of independent interest.
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Ensemble qubit controllability with a single control via adiabatic and rotating wave approximations
Abstract
In the physics literature it is common to see the rotating wave approximation andthe adiabatic approximation used "in cascade" to justify the use of chirped pulses for two-level quantum systems driven by one external field, in particular when the resonance frequency of the system is not known precisely. Both approximations need relatively long time and are essentially based on averaging theory of dynamical systems. Unfortunately, the two approximations cannot be done independently since, in a sense, the two time scales interact. The purpose of this paper is to study how the cascade of the two approximations can be justified and how large becomes the final time as the fidelity goes to one, while preserving the robustness of the adiabatic strategy. Our first result, based on high-order averaging techniques, gives a precise quantification of the uncertainty interval of the resonance frequency for which the population inversion works. As a byproduct of this result, we prove that it is possible to control an ensemble of spin systems by a single real-valued control, providing a non-trivial extension of a celebrated result of ensemble controllability with two controls by Khaneja and Li.