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Fei Yan

Publications and source records attributed to Fei Yan.

At least 55 records · Page 3Linked to original sources
arXiv2023

High-resolution transmission spectroscopy of ultra-hot Jupiter WASP-33b with NEID

We report an attempt to detect molecular and atomic species in the atmosphere of the ultra-hot Jupiter WASP-33b using the high-resolution echelle spectrograph NEID with a wavelength coverage of 380$-$930 nm. By analyzing the transmission spectrum of WASP-33b using the line-by-line technique and the cross-correlation technique, we confirm previous detection of H$α$, H$β$, H$γ$, and Ca II infrared triplets. We find no evidence for a significant day-to-night wind in WASP-33b, taking into account the effects of stellar pulsations using a relatively novel GP method and poorly constrained systemic velocity measurements. We also detect the previously reported pre-transit absorption signal, which may be a pulsation mode induced by the planet. Combined with previous CARMENES and HARPS-N observations, we report the non-detection of TiO, Ti I, and V I in the transmission spectrum, while they were already detected in the dayside atmosphere of WASP-33b. This implies a difference in the chemical compositions and abundances between the dayside and terminator atmospheres of WASP-33b, and certainly requires further improvements in the sensitivity of the detection methods.

astro-ph.EP↗
arXiv2023

Lattice Realizations of Topological Defects in the critical (1+1)-d Three-State Potts Model

Topological/perfectly-transmissive defects play a fundamental role in the analysis of the symmetries of two dimensional conformal field theories (CFTs). In the present work, spin chain regularizations for these defects are proposed and analyzed in the case of the three-state Potts CFT. In particular, lattice versions for all the primitive defects are presented, with the remaining defects obtained from the fusion of the primitive ones. The defects are obtained by introducing modified interactions around two given sites of an otherwise homogeneous spin chain with periodic boundary condition. The various primitive defects are topological on the lattice except for one, which is topological only in the scaling limit. The lattice models are analyzed using a combination of exact diagonalization and density matrix renormalization group techniques. Low-lying energy spectra for different defect Hamiltonians as well as entanglement entropy of blocks located symmetrically around the defects are computed. The latter provides a convenient way to compute the $g$-function which characterizes various defects. Finally, the eigenvalues of the line operators in the "crossed channel'' and fusion of different defect lines are also analyzed. The results are all in agreement with expectations from conformal field theory.

hep-th↗
arXiv2023

The PEPSI Exoplanet Transit Survey (PETS) IV: Assessing the atmospheric chemistry of KELT-20b

Most ultra hot Jupiters (UHJs) show evidence of temperature inversions, in which temperature increases with altitude over a range of pressures. Temperature inversions can occur when there is a species that absorbs the stellar irradiation at a relatively high level of the atmospheres. However, the species responsible for this absorption remains unidentified. In particular, the UHJ KELT-20b is known to have a temperature inversion. Using high resolution emission spectroscopy from LBT/PEPSI we investigate the atomic and molecular opacity sources that may cause the inversion in KELT-20b, as well as explore its atmospheric chemistry. We confirm the presence of Fe I with a significance of 17$σ$. We also report a tentative $4.3σ$ detection of Ni I. A nominally $4.5σ$ detection of Mg I emission in the PEPSI blue arm is likely in fact due to aliasing between the Mg I cross-correlation template and the Fe I lines present in the spectrum. We cannot reproduce a recent detection of Cr I, while we do not have the wavelength coverage to robustly test past detections of Fe II and Si I. Together with non-detections of molecular species like TiO, this suggests that Fe I is likely to be the dominant optical opacity source in the dayside atmosphere of KELT-20b and may be responsible for the temperature inversion. We explore ways to reconcile the differences between our results and those in literature and point to future paths to understand atmospheric variability.

astro-ph.EP↗
arXiv2023

Native Conditional $i$SWAP Operation with Superconducting Artificial Atoms

Controlling the flow of quantum information is a fundamental task for quantum computers, which is unfeasible to realize on classical devices. Coherent devices which can process quantum states are thus required to route the quantum states that encode information. In this paper we demonstrate experimentally the smallest quantum transistor with a superconducting quantum processor which is composed of a collector qubit, an emitter qubit, and a coupler (transistor gate). The interaction strength between the collector and emitter qubits is controlled by the frequency and state of the coupler, effectively implementing a quantum switch. Through the coupler-state-dependent Heisenberg (inherent) interaction between the qubits, a single-step (native) conditional $i$SWAP operation can be applied. To this end, we find that it is important to take into consideration higher energy level for achieving a native and high-fidelity transistor operation. By reconstructing the Quantum Process Tomography, we obtain an operation fidelity of $92.36\%$ when the transistor gate is open ($i$SWAP implementation) and $95.23 \%$ in the case of closed gate (identity gate implementation). The architecture has strong potential in quantum information processing applications with superconducting qubits.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2023

Commuting Line Defects At $q^N=1$

We explain the physical origin of a curious property of algebras $\mathcal{A}_\mathfrak{q}$ which encode the rotation-equivariant fusion ring of half-BPS line defects in four-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=2$ supersymmetric quantum field theories. These algebras are a quantization of the algebras of holomorphic functions on the three-dimensional Coulomb branch of the SQFTs, with deformation parameter $\log \mathfrak{q}$. They are known to acquire a large center, canonically isomorphic to the undeformed algebra, whenever $\mathfrak{q}$ is a root of unity. We give a physical explanation of this fact. We also generalize the construction to characterize the action of this center in the $\mathcal{A}_\mathfrak{q}$-modules associated to three-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=2$ boundary conditions. Finally, we use dualities to relate this construction to a construction in the Kapustin-Witten twist of four-dimensional $\mathcal{N}=4$ gauge theory. These considerations give simple physical explanations of certain properties of quantized skein algebras and cluster varieties, and quantum groups, when the deformation parameter is a root of unity.

hep-th↗
arXiv2023

Atmospheric composition of WASP-85Ab with ESPRESSO/VLT observations

Transit spectroscopy is the most frequently used technique to reveal the atmospheric properties of exoplanets, while that at high resolution has the advantage to resolve the small Doppler shift of spectral lines, and the trace signal of the exoplanet atmosphere can be separately extracted. We obtain the transmission spectra of the extrasolar planet WASP-85Ab, a hot Jupiter in a 2.655-day orbit around a G5, V=11.2 mag host star, observed by high-resolution spectrograph ESPRESSO at the Very Large Telescope array for three transits. We present an analysis of the Rossiter-McLaughlin effect on WASP-85A, and determine a spin-orbit angle ${λ= -16.155^{\circ}}^{+2.916}_{-2.879}$, suggesting that the planet is in an almost aligned orbit. Combining the transmission spectra of three nights, we tentatively detected H$α$ and Ca II absorption with $\gtrapprox 3σ$ via direct visual inspection of the transmission spectra with the Center-to-Limb variation and the Rossiter-McLaughlin effects removed, which still remain visible after excluding the cores of these strong lines with a 0.1 A mask. These spectral signals seems likely to origin from the planetary atmosphere, but we can not fully exclude their stellar origins. Via the cross-correlation analysis of a set of atoms and molecules, Li I is marginally detected at $\sim4σ$ level, suggesting that Li might be present in the atmosphere of WASP-85Ab.

astro-ph.EP↗
arXiv2023

Non-integrable Floquet Ising model with duality twisted boundary conditions

Results are presented for a Floquet Ising chain with duality twisted boundary conditions, taking into account the role of weak integrability breaking in the form of four-fermion interactions. In the integrable case, a single isolated Majorana zero mode exists which is a symmetry in the sense that it commutes both with the Floquet unitary and the $Z_2$ symmetry of the Floquet unitary. When integrability is weakly broken, both in a manner so as to preserve or break the $Z_2$ symmetry, the Majorana zero mode is still found to be conserved for small system sizes. This is reflected in the dynamics of an infinite temperature autocorrelation function which, after an initial transient that is controlled by the strength of the integrability breaking term, approaches a plateau that does not decay with time. The height of the plateau agrees with a numerically constructed conserved quantity, and is found to decrease with increasing system sizes. It is argued that the existence of the plateau and its vanishing for larger system sizes is closely related to a localization-delocalization transition in Fock space triggered by the integrability-breaking interactions.

cond-mat.str-el↗
arXiv2023

Near-Unity Emitting, Widely Tailorable and Stable Exciton Concentrators Built from Doubly Gradient 2D Semiconductor Nanoplatelets

The strength of electrostatic interactions (EI) between electrons and holes within semiconductor nanocrystals profoundly impact the performance of their optoelectronic systems, and different optoelectronic devices demand distinct EI strength of the active medium. However, achieving a broad range, fine-tuning of the EI strength for specific optoelectronic applications is a daunting challenge, especially in quasi 2-dimensional core-shell semiconductor nanoplatelets (NPLs), as the epitaxial growth of the inorganic shell along the direction of the thickness that solely contributes to the quantum confined effect significantly undermines the strength of the EI. Herein we propose and demonstrate a novel doubly-gradient (DG) core-shell architecture of semiconductor NPLs for on-demand tailoring of the EI strength by controlling the localized exciton concentration via in-plane architectural modulation, demonstrated by a wide tuning of radiative recombination rate and exciton binding energy. Moreover, these exciton-concentration-engineered DG NPLs also exhibit a near-unity quantum yield, remarkable thermal and photo stability, as well as considerably suppressed self-absorption. As proof-of-concept demonstrations, highly efficient color converters and high-performance light-emitting diodes (external quantum efficiency: 16.9%, maximum luminance: 43,000 cd/m2) have been achieved based on the DG NPLs. This work thus opens up new avenues for developing high-performance colloidal optoelectronic device applications.

physics.optics↗
arXiv2023

Multi-Level Variational Spectroscopy using a Programmable Quantum Simulator

Energy spectroscopy is a powerful tool with diverse applications across various disciplines. The advent of programmable digital quantum simulators opens new possibilities for conducting spectroscopy on various models using a single device. Variational quantum-classical algorithms have emerged as a promising approach for achieving such tasks on near-term quantum simulators, despite facing significant quantum and classical resource overheads. Here, we experimentally demonstrate multi-level variational spectroscopy for fundamental many-body Hamiltonians using a superconducting programmable digital quantum simulator. By exploiting symmetries, we effectively reduce circuit depth and optimization parameters allowing us to go beyond the ground state. Combined with the subspace search method, we achieve full spectroscopy for a 4-qubit Heisenberg spin chain, yielding an average deviation of 0.13 between experimental and theoretical energies, assuming unity coupling strength. Our method, when extended to 8-qubit Heisenberg and transverse-field Ising Hamiltonians, successfully determines the three lowest energy levels. In achieving the above, we introduce a circuit-agnostic waveform compilation method that enhances the robustness of our simulator against signal crosstalk. Our study highlights symmetry-assisted resource efficiency in variational quantum algorithms and lays the foundation for practical spectroscopy on near-term quantum simulators, with potential applications in quantum chemistry and condensed matter physics.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2023

Exploring Turn Signal Usage Patterns in Lane Changes: A Bayesian Hierarchical Modelling Analysis of Realistic Driving Data

Using turn signals to convey a driver's intention to change lanes provides a direct and unambiguous way of communicating with nearby drivers. Nonetheless, past research has indicated that drivers may not always use their turn signals prior to starting a lane change. In this study, we analyze realistic driving data to investigate turn signal usage during lane changes on highways in and around Gothenburg, Sweden. We examine turn signal usage and identify factors that have an influence on it by employing Bayesian hierarchical modelling (BHM). The results showed that a turn signal was used in approximately 60% of cases before starting a lane change, while it was only used after the start of a lane change in 33% of cases. In 7% of cases, a turn signal was not used at all. Additionally, the BHM results reveal that various factors influence turn signal usage. The study concludes that understanding the factors that affect turn signal usage is crucial for improving traffic safety through policy-making and designing algorithms for autonomous vehicles for future mixed traffic.

stat.AP↗
arXiv2023

Beating the break-even point with a discrete-variable-encoded logical qubit

Quantum error correction (QEC) aims to protect logical qubits from noises by utilizing the redundancy of a large Hilbert space, where an error, once it occurs, can be detected and corrected in real time. In most QEC codes, a logical qubit is encoded in some discrete variables, e.g., photon numbers. Such encoding schemes make the codewords orthogonal, so that the encoded quantum information can be unambiguously extracted after processing. Based on such discrete-variable encodings, repetitive QEC demonstrations have been reported on various platforms, but there the lifetime of the encoded logical qubit is still shorter than that of the best available physical qubit in the entire system, which represents a break-even point that needs to be surpassed for any QEC code to be of practical use. Here we demonstrate a QEC procedure with a logical qubit encoded in photon-number states of a microwave cavity, dispersively coupled to an ancilla superconducting qubit. By applying a pulse featuring a tailored frequency comb to the ancilla, we can repetitively extract the error syndrome with high fidelity and perform error correction with feedback control accordingly, thereby exceeding the break-even point by about 16% lifetime enhancement. Our work illustrates the potential of the hardware-efficient discrete-variable QEC codes towards a reliable quantum information processor.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2023

Solar center-to-limb variation in Rossiter-McLaughlin and exoplanet transmission spectroscopy

Line profiles from spatially unresolved stellar observations consist of a superposition of local line profiles that result from observing the stellar atmosphere under specific viewing angles. Line profile variability caused by stellar magnetic activity or planetary transit selectively varies the weight and/or shape of profiles at individual surface positions. The effect is usually modeled with radiative transfer calculations because observations of spatially resolved stellar surfaces are not available. For the Sun, we recently obtained a broadband spectroscopic atlas of the solar center-to-limb variation (CLV). We use the atlas to study systematic differences between largely used radiative transfer calculations and solar observations. We concentrate on four strong lines useful for exoplanet transmission analysis, and we investigate the impact of CLV on transmission and Rossiter-McLaughlin (RM) curves. Solar models used to calculate synthetic spectra tend to underestimate line core depths but overestimate the effect of CLV. Our study shows that CLV can lead to significant systematic offsets in transmission curves and particularly in RM curves; transmission curves centered on individual lines are overestimated by up to a factor of two by the models, and simulations of RM curves yield amplitudes that are off by up to 5--10\,m\,s$^{-1}$ depending on the line. For the interpretation of transit observations, it is crucial for model spectra that accurately reproduce the solar CLV to become available which, for now, is the only calibration point available.

astro-ph.SR↗
arXiv2023

Low-loss interconnects for modular superconducting quantum processors

Scaling is now a key challenge in superconducting quantum computing. One solution is to build modular systems in which smaller-scale quantum modules are individually constructed and calibrated, and then assembled into a larger architecture. This, however, requires the development of suitable interconnects. Here, we report low-loss interconnects based on pure aluminium coaxial cables and on-chip impedance transformers featuring quality factors up to $8.1 \times 10^5$, which is comparable to the performance of our transmon qubits fabricated on single-crystal sapphire substrate. We use these interconnects to link five quantum modules with inter-module quantum state transfer and Bell state fidelities up to 99\%. To benchmark the overall performance of the processor, we create maximally-entangled, multi-qubit Greenberger-Horne-Zeilinger (GHZ) states. The generated inter-module four-qubit GHZ state exhibits 92.0\% fidelity. We also entangle up to 12 qubits in a GHZ state with $55.8 \pm 1.8\%$ fidelity, which is above the genuine multipartite entanglement threshold of 1/2. These results represent a viable modular approach for large-scale superconducting quantum processors.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2023

Experimental Realization of Two Qutrits Gate with Tunable Coupling in Superconducting Circuits

Gate-based quantum computation has been extensively investigated using quantum circuits based on qubits. In many cases, such qubits are actually made out of multilevel systems but with only two states being used for computational purpose. While such a strategy has the advantage of being in line with the common binary logic, it in some sense wastes the ready-for-use resources in the large Hilbert space of these intrinsic multi-dimensional systems. Quantum computation beyond qubits (e.g., using qutrits or qudits) has thus been discussed and argued to be more efficient than its qubit counterpart in certain scenarios. However, one of the essential elements for qutrit-based quantum computation, two-qutrit quantum gate, remains a major challenge. In this work, we propose and demonstrate a highly efficient and scalable two-qutrit quantum gate in superconducting quantum circuits. Using a tunable coupler to control the cross-Kerr coupling between two qutrits, our scheme realizes a two-qutrit conditional phase gate with fidelity 89.3% by combining simple pulses applied to the coupler with single-qutrit operations. We further use such a two-qutrit gate to prepare an EPR state of two qutrits with a fidelity of 95.5%. Our scheme takes advantage of a tunable qutrit-qutrit coupling with a large on:off ratio. It therefore offers both high efficiency and low cross talk between qutrits, thus being friendly for scaling up. Our work constitutes an important step towards scalable qutrit-based quantum computation.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2023

The PEPSI Exoplanet Transit Survey (PETS). II. A Deep Search for Thermal Inversion Agents in KELT-20 b/MASCARA-2 b with Emission and Transmission Spectroscopy

Recent observations have shown that the atmospheres of ultra hot Jupiters (UHJs) commonly possess temperature inversions, where the temperature increases with increasing altitude. Nonetheless, which opacity sources are responsible for the presence of these inversions remains largely observationally unconstrained. We used LBT/PEPSI to observe the atmosphere of the UHJ KELT-20 b in both transmission and emission in order to search for molecular agents which could be responsible for the temperature inversion. We validate our methodology by confirming previous detections of Fe I in emission at $16.9σ$. Our search for the inversion agents TiO, VO, FeH, and CaH results in non-detections. Using injection-recovery testing we set $4σ$ upper limits upon the volume mixing ratios for these constituents as low as $\sim1\times10^{-9}$ for TiO. For TiO, VO, and CaH, our limits are much lower than expectations from an equilibrium chemical model, while we cannot set constraining limits on FeH with our data. We thus rule out TiO and CaH as the source of the temperature inversion in KELT-20 b, and VO only if the line lists are sufficiently accurate.

astro-ph.EP↗
arXiv2022

Engineering superconducting qubits to reduce quasiparticles and charge noise

Identifying, quantifying, and suppressing decoherence mechanisms in qubits are important steps towards the goal of engineering a quantum computer or simulator. Superconducting circuits offer flexibility in qubit design; however, their performance is adversely affected by quasiparticles (broken Cooper pairs). Developing a quasiparticle mitigation strategy compatible with scalable, high-coherence devices is therefore highly desirable. Here we experimentally demonstrate how to control quasiparticle generation by downsizing the qubit, capping it with a metallic cover, and equipping it with suitable quasiparticle traps. Using a flip-chip design, we shape the electromagnetic environment of the qubit above the superconducting gap, inhibiting quasiparticle poisoning. Our findings support the hypothesis that quasiparticle generation is dominated by the breaking of Cooper pairs at the junction, as a result of photon absorption by the antenna-like qubit structure. We achieve record low charge-parity switching rate (<1Hz). Our aluminium devices also display improved stability with respect to discrete charging events.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2022

Optimal charging of a superconducting quantum battery

Quantum batteries are miniature energy storage devices and play a very important role in quantum thermodynamics. In recent years, quantum batteries have been extensively studied, but limited in theoretical level. Here we report the experimental realization of a quantum battery based on superconducting qubits. Our model explores dark and bright states to achieve stable and powerful charging processes, respectively. Our scheme makes use of the quantum adiabatic brachistochrone, which allows us to speed up the {battery ergotropy injection. Due to the inherent interaction of the system with its surrounding, the battery exhibits a self-discharge, which is shown to be described by a supercapacitor-like self-discharging mechanism. Our results paves the way for proposals of new superconducting circuits able to store extractable work for further usage.

quant-ph↗
arXiv2022

Scalable Method for Eliminating Residual $ZZ$ Interaction between Superconducting Qubits

Unwanted $ZZ$ interaction is a quantum-mechanical crosstalk phenomenon which correlates qubit dynamics and is ubiquitous in superconducting qubit systems. It adversely affects the quality of quantum operations and can be detrimental in scalable quantum information processing. Here we propose and experimentally demonstrate a practically extensible approach for complete cancellation of residual $ZZ$ interaction between fixed-frequency transmon qubits, which are known for long coherence and simple control. We apply to the intermediate coupler that connects the qubits a weak microwave drive at a properly chosen frequency in order to noninvasively induce an ac Stark shift for $ZZ$ cancellation. We verify the cancellation performance by measuring vanishing two-qubit entangling phases and $ZZ$ correlations. In addition, we implement a randomized benchmarking experiment to extract the idling gate fidelity which shows good agreement with the coherence limit, demonstrating the effectiveness of $ZZ$ cancellation. Our method allows independent addressability of each qubit-qubit connection, and is applicable to both nontunable and tunable couplers, promising better compatibility with future large-scale quantum processors.

quant-ph↗