Searcharxiv⌕ Search

arXiv subjects

Luming Duan

Publications and source records attributed to Luming Duan.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

A flying Schrödinger cat in multipartite entangled states

Schrödinger's cat originates from the famous thought experiment querying the counterintuitive quantum superposition of macroscopic objects. As a natural extension, several "cats" (quasi-classical objects) can be prepared into coherent quantum superposition states, which is known as multipartite cat states demonstrating quantum entanglement among macroscopically distinct objects. Here we present a highly scalable approach to deterministically create flying multipartite Schrödinger cat states, by reflecting coherent state photons from a microwave cavity containing a superconducting qubit. We perform full quantum state tomography on the cat states with up to four photonic modes and confirm the existence of quantum entanglement among them. We also witness the hybrid entanglement between discrete-variable states (the qubit) and continuous-variable states (the flying multipartite cat) through a joint quantum state tomography. Our work demonstrates an important experimental control method in the microwave region and provides an enabling step for implementing a series of quantum metrology and quantum information processing protocols based on cat states.

quant-ph↗

Experimental demonstration of memory-enhanced scaling for entanglement connection of quantum repeater segments

The quantum repeater protocol is a promising approach to implement long-distance quantum communication and large-scale quantum networks. A key idea of the quantum repeater protocol is to use long-lived quantum memories to achieve efficient entanglement connection between different repeater segments with a polynomial scaling. Here we report an experiment which realizes efficient connection of two quantum repeater segments via on-demand entanglement swapping by the use of two atomic quantum memories with storage time of tens of milliseconds. With the memory enhancement, scaling-changing acceleration is demonstrated in the rate for a successful entanglement connection. The experimental realization of entanglement connection of two quantum repeater segments with an efficient memory-enhanced scaling demonstrates a key advantage of the quantum repeater protocol, which makes a cornerstone towards future large-scale quantum networks.

quant-ph↗

On-Demand Storage and Retrieval of Microwave Photons Using a Superconducting Multiresonator Quantum Memory

A quantum memory that can store quantum states faithfully and retrieve them on demand has wide applications in quantum information science. An efficient quantum memory in the microwave regime working alongside quantum processors based on superconducting quantum circuits may serve as an important architecture for quantum computers. Here we realize on-demand storage and retrieval of weak coherent microwave photon pulses at the single-photon level. We implement a superconducting multi-resonator quantum memory which is composed of a set of frequency-tunable coplanar transmission line (CPW) resonators. By dynamically tuning the resonant frequencies of the resonators, we achieve tunable memory bandwidth from 10 MHz to 55 MHz, with an overall storage efficiency up to 12 % with well preserved phase coherence. We further demonstrate on-demand storage and retrieval of a time-bin flying qubit. This result opens up a prospect to integrate our chip-based quantum memory with the state-of-the-art superconducting quantum circuit technology for quantum information processing.

quant-ph↗

Improved superconducting qubit state readout by path interference

High fidelity single shot qubit state readout is essential for many quantum information processing protocols. In superconducting quantum circuit, the qubit state is usually determined by detecting the dispersive frequency shift of a microwave cavity from either transmission or reflection. In this paper, we demonstrate the use of constructive interference between the transmitted and reflected signal to optimize the qubit state readout, with which we find a better resolved state discrimination and an improved qubit readout fidelity. As a simple and convenient approach, our scheme can be combined with other qubit readout methods based on the discrimination of cavity photon states to further improve the qubit state readout.

quant-ph↗

Multicell Atomic Quantum Memory as a Hardware-Efficient Quantum Repeater Node

For scalable quantum communication and networks, a key step is to realize a quantum repeater node that can efficiently connect different segments of atom-photon entanglement using quantum memories. We report a compact and hardware-efficient realization of a quantum repeater node using a single atomic ensemble for multicell quantum memories. Millisecond lifetime is achieved for individual memory cells after suppressing the magnetic-field-induced inhomogeneous broadening and the atomic-motion-induced spin-wave dephasing. Based on these long-lived multicell memory cells, we achieve heralded asynchronous entanglement generation in two quantum repeater segments one after another and then an on-demand entanglement connection of these two repeater segments. As another application of the multicell atomic quantum memory, we further demonstrate storage and on-demand retrieval of heralded atomic spin-wave qubits by implementing a random access quantum memory with individual addressing capacity. This work provides a promising constituent for efficient realization of quantum repeaters for large-scale quantum networks.

quant-ph↗

Observation of heat scaling across a first-order quantum phase transition in a spinor condensate

Heat generated as a result of the breakdown of an adiabatic process is one of the central concepts of thermodynamics. In isolated systems, the heat can be defined as an energy increase due to transitions between distinct energy levels. Across a second-order quantum phase transition (QPT), the heat is predicted theoretically to exhibit a power-law scaling, but it is a significant challenge for an experimental observation. In addition, it remains elusive whether a power-law scaling of heat can exist for a first-order QPT. Here we experimentally observe a power-law scaling of heat in a spinor condensate when a system is linearly driven from a polar phase to an antiferromagnetic phase across a first-order QPT. We experimentally evaluate the heat generated during two non-equilibrium processes by probing the atom number on a hyperfine energy level. The experimentally measured scaling exponents agree well with our numerical simulation results. Our work therefore opens a new avenue to experimentally and theoretically exploring the properties of heat in non-equilibrium dynamics.

cond-mat.quant-gas↗

Tunable coupler for realizing a controlled-phase gate with dynamically decoupled regime in a superconducting circuit

Controllable interaction between superconducting qubits is desirable for large-scale quantum computation and simulation. Here, based on a theoretical proposal by Yan et al. [Phys. Rev. Appl. 10, 054061 (2018)] we experimentally demonstrate a simply-designed and flux-controlled tunable coupler with a continuous tunability by adjusting the coupler frequency, which can completely turn off adjacent superconducting qubit coupling. Utilizing the tunable interaction between two qubits via the coupler, we implement a different type of controlled-phase (CZ) gate with 'dynamically decoupled regime', which allows the qubit-qubit coupling to be only 'on' at the usual operating point while dynamically 'off' during the tuning process of one qubit frequency into and out of the operating point. This scheme not only efficiently suppresses the leakage out of the computational subspace, but also allows for the acquired two-qubit phase being geometric at the operating point. We achieve an average CZ gate fidelity of 98.3(0.6), which is dominantly limited by qubit decoherence. The demonstrated tunable coupler provides a desirable tool to suppress adjacent qubit coupling and is suitable for large scale quantum computation and simulation.

quant-ph↗

Entangling Nuclear Spins by Dissipation in a Solid-state System

Entanglement is a fascinating feature of quantum mechanics and a key ingredient in most quantum information processing tasks. Yet the generation of entanglement is usually hampered by undesired dissipation owing to the inevitable coupling of a system with its environment. Here, we report an experiment on how to entangle two $^{13}$C nuclear spins via engineered dissipation in a nitrogen-vacancy system. We utilize the electron spin as an ancilla, and combine unitary processes together with optical pumping of the ancilla to implement the engineered dissipation and deterministically produce an entangled state of the two nuclear spins, independent of their initial states. Our experiment demonstrates the power of engineered dissipation as a tool for generation of multi-qubit entanglement in solid-state systems.

quant-ph↗

Experimental Test of Leggett's Inequalities with Solid-State Spins

Bell's theorem states that no local hidden variable model is compatible with quantum mechanics. Surprisingly, even if we release the locality constraint, certain nonlocal hidden variable models, such as the one proposed by Leggett, may still be at variance with the predictions of quantum physics. Here, we report an experimental test of Leggett's nonlocal model with solid-state spins in a diamond nitrogen-vacancy center. We entangle an electron spin with a surrounding weakly coupled $^{13}C$ nuclear spin and observe that the entangled states violate Leggett-type inequalities by more than four and seven standard deviations for six and eight measurement settings, respectively. Our experimental results are in full agreement with quantum predictions and violate Leggett's nonlocal hidden variable inequality with a high level of confidence.

quant-ph↗

High dimensional entanglement between a photon and a multiplexed atomic quantum memory

Multiplexed quantum memories and high-dimensional entanglement can improve the performance of quantum repeaters by promoting the entanglement generation rate and the quantum communication channel capacity. Here, we experimentally generate a high-dimensional entangled state between a photon and a collective spin wave excitation stored in the multiplexed atomic quantum memory. We verify the entanglement dimension by the quantum witness and the entanglement of formation. Then we use the high-dimensional entangled state to test the violation of the Bell-type inequality. Our work provides an effective method to generate multidimensional entanglement between the flying photonic pulses and the atomic quantum interface.

quant-ph↗

Quantum Communication between Multiplexed Atomic Quantum Memories

The use of multiplexed atomic quantum memories (MAQM) can significantly enhance the efficiency to establish entanglement in a quantum network. In the previous experiments, individual elements of a quantum network, such as the generation, storage and transmission of quantum entanglement have been demonstrated separately. Here we report an experiment to show the compatibility of these basic operations. Specifically, we generate photon-atom entanglement in a $6\times 5$ MAQM, convert the spin wave to time-bin photonic excitation after a controllable storage time, and then store and retrieve the photon in a second MAQM for another controllable storage time. The preservation of quantum information in this process is verified by measuring the state fidelity. We also show that our scheme supports quantum systems with higher dimension than a qubit.

quant-ph↗

Two-qubit entangling gates within arbitrarily long chains of trapped ions

Ion trap systems are a leading platform for large scale quantum computers. Trapped ion qubit crystals are fully-connected and reconfigurable, owing to their long range Coulomb interaction that can be modulated with external optical forces. However, the spectral crowding of collective motional modes could pose a challenge to the control of such interactions for large numbers of qubits. Here, we show that high-fidelity quantum gate operations are still possible with very large trapped ion crystals, simplifying the scaling of ion trap quantum computers. To this end, we present analytical work that determines how parallel entangling gates produce a crosstalk error that falls off as the inverse cube of the distance between the pairs. We also show experimental work demonstrating entangling gates on a fully-connected chain of seventeen $^{171}{\rm{Yb}}^{+}$ ions with fidelities as high as $97(1)\%$.

physics.atom-ph↗

Efficient classical simulation of noisy quantum computation

Understanding the boundary between classical simulatability and the power of quantum computation is a fascinating topic. Direct simulation of noisy quantum computation requires solving an open quantum many-body system, which is very costly. Here, we develop a tensor network formalism to simulate the time-dynamics and the Fourier spectrum of noisy quantum circuits. We prove that under general conditions most of the quantum circuits at any constant level of noise per gate can be efficiently simulated classically with the cost increasing only polynomially with the size of the circuits. The result holds even if we have perfect noiseless quantum gates for some subsets of operations, such as all the gates in the Clifford group. This surprising result reveals the subtle relations between classical simulatability, quantum supremacy, and fault-tolerant quantum computation. The developed simulation tools may also be useful for solving other open quantum many-body systems.

quant-ph↗

Intrinsic Retrieval Efficiency for Quantum Memory: A Three Dimensional Theory of Light Interaction with an Atomic Ensemble

Duan-Lukin-Cirac-Zoller (DLCZ) quantum repeater protocol, which was proposed to realize long distance quantum communication, requires usage of quantum memories. Atomic ensembles interacting with optical beams based on off-resonant Raman scattering serve as convenient on-demand quantum memories. Here, a complete free space, three-dimensional theory of the associated read and write process for this quantum memory is worked out with the aim of understanding intrinsic retrieval efficiency. We develop a formalism to calculate the transverse mode structure for the signal and the idler photons and use the formalism to study the intrinsic retrieval efficiency under various configurations. The effects of atomic density fluctuations and atomic motion are incorporated by numerically simulating this system for a range of realistic experimental parameters. We obtain results that describe the variation in the intrinsic retrieval efficiency as a function of the memory storage time for skewed beam configuration at a finite temperature, which provides valuable information for optimization of the retrieval efficiency in experiments.

quant-ph↗

An efficient quantum algorithm for generative machine learning

A central task in the field of quantum computing is to find applications where quantum computer could provide exponential speedup over any classical computer. Machine learning represents an important field with broad applications where quantum computer may offer significant speedup. Several quantum algorithms for discriminative machine learning have been found based on efficient solving of linear algebraic problems, with potential exponential speedup in runtime under the assumption of effective input from a quantum random access memory. In machine learning, generative models represent another large class which is widely used for both supervised and unsupervised learning. Here, we propose an efficient quantum algorithm for machine learning based on a quantum generative model. We prove that our proposed model is exponentially more powerful to represent probability distributions compared with classical generative models and has exponential speedup in training and inference at least for some instances under a reasonable assumption in computational complexity theory. Our result opens a new direction for quantum machine learning and offers a remarkable example in which a quantum algorithm shows exponential improvement over any classical algorithm in an important application field.

quant-ph↗

Simulating the performance of a distance-3 surface code in a linear ion trap

We explore the feasibility of implementing a small surface code with 9 data qubits and 8 ancilla qubits, commonly referred to as surface-17, using a linear chain of 171Yb+ ions. Two-qubit gates can be performed between any two ions in the chain with gate time increasing linearly with ion distance. Measurement of the ion state by fluorescence requires that the ancilla qubits be physically separated from the data qubits to avoid errors on the data due to scattered photons. We minimize the time required to measure one round of stabilizers by optimizing the mapping of the two-dimensional surface code to the linear chain of ions. We develop a physically motivated Pauli error model that allows for fast simulation and captures the key sources of noise in an ion trap quantum computer including gate imperfections and ion heating. Our simulations showed a consistent requirement of a two-qubit gate fidelity of > 99.9% for logical memory to have a better fidelity than physical two-qubit operations. Finally, we perform an analysis on the error subsets from the importance sampling method used to approximate the logical error rates in this paper to gain insight into which error sources are particularly detrimental to error correction.

quant-ph↗

Quantum interface between a transmon qubit and spins of nitrogen-vacancy centers

Hybrid quantum circuits combining advantages of each individual system have provided a promising platform for quantum information processing. Here we propose an experimental scheme to directly couple a transmon qubit to an individual spin in the nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center, with a coupling strength three orders of magnitude larger than that for a single spin coupled to a microwave cavity. This direct coupling between the transmon and the NV center could be utilized to make a transmon bus, leading to a coherently virtual exchange among different single spins. Furthermore, we demonstrate that, by coupling a transmon to a low-density NV ensemble, a SWAP operation between the transmon and NV ensemble is feasible and a quantum non-demolition measurement on the state of NV ensemble can be realized on the cavity-transmon-NV-ensemble hybrid system. Moreover, on this system, a virtual coupling can be achieved between the cavity and NV ensemble, which is much larger in magnitude than the direct coupling between the cavity and the NV ensemble. The photon state in cavity can be thus stored into NV spins more efficiently through this virtual coupling.

quant-ph↗

Bound state properties of ABC-stacked trilayer graphene quantum dots

The few-layer graphene quantum dot provides a promising platform for quantum computing with both spin and valley degrees of freedom. Gate-defined quantum dots in particular can avoid noise from edge disorders. In connection with the recent experimental efforts [Y. Song et al., Nano Lett. 16, 6245 (2016)], we investigate the bound state properties of trilayer graphene (TLG) quantum dots (QDs) through numerical simulations. We show that the valley degeneracy can be lifted by breaking the time reversal symmetry through the application of a perpendicular magnetic field. The spectrum under such a potential exhibits a transition from one group of Landau levels to the other group, which can be understood analytically through perturbation theory. Our results provide insight to the transport property of TLG QDs, with possible applications to study of spin qubits and valleytronics in TLG QDs.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗