arXiv subjects

S. Das Sarma

Publications and source records attributed to S. Das Sarma.

At least 91 records · Page 5Linked to original sources

arXiv2017

Quantum Entanglement in Neural Network States

Machine learning, one of today's most rapidly growing interdisciplinary fields, promises an unprecedented perspective for solving intricate quantum many-body problems. Understanding the physical aspects of the representative artificial neural-network states is recently becoming highly desirable in the applications of machine learning techniques to quantum many-body physics. Here, we study the quantum entanglement properties of neural-network states, with a focus on the restricted-Boltzmann-machine (RBM) architecture. We prove that the entanglement of all short-range RBM states satisfies an area law for arbitrary dimensions and bipartition geometry. For long-range RBM states we show by using an exact construction that such states could exhibit volume-law entanglement, implying a notable capability of RBM in representing efficiently quantum states with massive entanglement. We further examine generic RBM states with random weight parameters. We find that their averaged entanglement entropy obeys volume-law scaling and meantime strongly deviates from the Page-entropy of the completely random pure states. We show that their entanglement spectrum has no universal part associated with random matrix theory and bears a Poisson-type level statistics. Using reinforcement learning, we demonstrate that RBM is capable of finding the ground state (with power-law entanglement) of a model Hamiltonian with long-range interaction. In addition, we show, through a concrete example of the one-dimensional symmetry-protected topological cluster states, that the RBM representation may also be used as a tool to analytically compute the entanglement spectrum. Our results uncover the unparalleled power of artificial neural networks in representing quantum many-body states, which paves a novel way to bridge computer science based machine learning techniques to outstanding quantum condensed matter physics problems.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2017

Competition between Kondo effect and RKKY physics in graphene magnetism

The cooperative behavior of quantum impurities on 2D materials, such as graphene and bilayer graphene, is characterized by a non-trivial competition between screening (Kondo effect), and Ruderman-Kittel-Kasuya-Yosida (RKKY) magnetism. In addition, due to the small density of states at the Fermi level, impurities may not couple to the conduction electrons at all, behaving as free moments. Employing a recently developed {\em{exact}} numerical method to study multi-impurity lattice systems, we obtain non-perturbative results that dramatically depart from expectations based on the conventional RKKY theory. At half-filling and for weak coupling, impurities remain in the local moment regime when they are on opposite sublattices, up to a critical value of the interactions when they start coupling anti-ferromagnetically with correlations that decay very slowly with inter-impurity distance. At finite doping, away from half-filling, ferromagnetism is completely absent and the physics is dominated by a competition between anti-ferromagnetism and Kondo effect. In bilayer graphene, impurities on opposite layers behave as free moments, unless the interaction is of the order of the hopping or larger.

cond-mat.str-el↗

arXiv2017

Quantum simulation of a Fermi-Hubbard model using a semiconductor quantum dot array

Interacting fermions on a lattice can develop strong quantum correlations, which lie at the heart of the classical intractability of many exotic phases of matter. Seminal efforts are underway in the control of artificial quantum systems, that can be made to emulate the underlying Fermi-Hubbard models. Electrostatically confined conduction band electrons define interacting quantum coherent spin and charge degrees of freedom that allow all-electrical pure-state initialisation and readily adhere to an engineerable Fermi-Hubbard Hamiltonian. Until now, however, the substantial electrostatic disorder inherent to solid state has made attempts at emulating Fermi-Hubbard physics on solid-state platforms few and far between. Here, we show that for gate-defined quantum dots, this disorder can be suppressed in a controlled manner. Novel insights and a newly developed semi-automated and scalable toolbox allow us to homogeneously and independently dial in the electron filling and nearest-neighbour tunnel coupling. Bringing these ideas and tools to fruition, we realize the first detailed characterization of the collective Coulomb blockade transition, which is the finite-size analogue of the interaction-driven Mott metal-to-insulator transition. As automation and device fabrication of semiconductor quantum dots continue to improve, the ideas presented here show how quantum dots can be used to investigate the physics of ever more complex many-body states.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Role of dissipation in realistic Majorana nanowires

We carry out a realistic simulation of Majorana nanowires in order to understand the latest high- quality experimental data [H. Zhang et al., arXiv:1603.04069 (2016)] and, in the process, develop a comprehensive picture for what physical mechanisms may be operational in realistic nanowires leading to discrepancies between minimal theory and experimental observations (e.g., weakness and broadening of the zero-bias peak and breaking of particle-hole symmetry). Our focus is on understanding specific intriguing features in the data, and our goal is to establish matters of principle controlling the physics of the best possible nanowires available in current experiments. We identify dissipation, finite temperature, multi-sub-band effects, and the finite tunnel barrier as the four most important physical mechanisms controlling the zero-bias conductance peak. Our theoretical results including these realistic effects agree well with the best available experimental data in ballistic nanowires.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Ferromagnetism in chiral multilayer 2D semimetals

We calculate the temperature dependent long-range magnetic coupling in the presence of dilute concentrations of random magnetic impurities in chiral multilayer two-dimensional semimetals, i.e., undoped intrinsic multilayer graphene. Assuming a carrier-mediated indirect RKKY exchange interaction among the well-separated magnetic impurities with the itinerant carriers mediating the magnetic interaction between the impurities, we investigate the magnetic properties of intrinsic multilayer graphene using an effective chiral Hamiltonian model. We find that due to the enhanced density of states in the rhombohedral stacking sequence of graphene layers, the magnetic ordering of multilayer graphene is ferromagnetic in the continuum limit. The ferromagnetic transition temperature is calculated using a finite-temperature self-consistent field approximation and found to be within the experimentally accessible range for reasonable values of the impurity-carrier coupling.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Environmental noise effects on entanglement fidelity of exchange-coupled semiconductor spin qubits

We investigate the effect of magnetic field and charge noise on the generation of entanglement between two Heisenberg exchange-coupled electron spins in a double quantum dot. We focus on exchange-driven evolution that would ideally take an initial unentangled tensor product state to a maximally-entangled state in the absence of noise. The presence of noise obviously adversely affects the attainment of maximal entanglement, which we study quantitatively and exactly. To quantify the effects of noise, we calculate two-qubit coherence times and entanglement fidelity, both of which can be extracted from simulations or measurements of the return probability as a function of interaction time, i.e., the time period during which the exchange coupling remains effective between the two spins. We perform these calculations for a broad range of noise strengths that includes the regime of recent experiments. We find that the two types of noise reduce the amount of entanglement in qualitatively distinct ways and that, although charge noise generally leads to faster decoherence, the relative importance of the two types of noise in entanglement creation depends sensitively on the strength of the exchange coupling. Our results can be used to determine the level of noise suppression needed to reach quantum error correction thresholds. We provide quantitative guidance for the requisite noise constraints necessary to eventually reach the $>99\%$ fidelity consistent with the quantum error correction threshold.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Impurity-driven intervalley spin-flip scattering-induced 2D spin relaxation in silicon

Through the theoretical study of electron spin lifetime in the 2DEG of doped Si, we highlight a dominant spin relaxation mechanism induced by the impurity central-cell potential near an interface via intervalley electron scattering. At low temperatures and with modest doping, this Yafet spin flip mechanism can become much more important than the Dyakonov-Perel spin relaxation indcued by the structural Rashba spin-orbit coupling field. As the leading-order impurity-induced spin flip happens only between two non-opposite valleys in Si, two-dimensional electron gas (2DEG) systems in Si MOSFETs or SiGe heterostructures are a natural platform to test and utilize this spin relaxation mechanism due to the valley splitting near the interface and its tunability by electrical gating or applied stress. Our proposed new spin relaxation mechanism may explain a part of the spin relaxation contribution to Si-based 2DEG systems.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Logarithmic Entanglement Lightcone in Many-Body Localized Systems

We theoretically study the response of a many-body localized system to a local quench from a quantum information perspective. We find that the local quench triggers entanglement growth throughout the whole system, giving rise to a logarithmic lightcone. This saturates the modified Lieb-Robinson bound for quantum information propagation in many-body localized systems previously conjectured based on the existence of local integrals of motion. In addition, near the localization-delocalization transition, we find that the final states after the local quench exhibit volume-law entanglement. We also show that the local quench induces a deterministic orthogonality catastrophe for highly excited eigenstates, where the typical wave-function overlap between the pre- and post-quench eigenstates decays {\it exponentially} with the system size.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2017

Statistical exchange-coupling errors and the practicality of scalable silicon donor qubits

Recent experimental efforts have led to considerable interest in donor-based localized electron spins in Si as viable qubits for a scalable silicon quantum computer. With the use of isotopically purified $^{28}$Si and the realization of extremely long spin coherence time in single-donor electrons, the recent experimental focus is on two-coupled donors with the eventual goal of a scaled-up quantum circuit. Motivated by this development, we simulate the statistical distribution of the exchange coupling $J$ between a pair of donors under realistic donor placement straggles, and quantify the errors relative to the intended $J$ value. With $J$ values in a broad range of donor-pair separation ($5<|\mathbf{R}|<60$ nm), we work out various cases systematically, for a target donor separation $\mathbf{R}_0$ along the [001], [110] and [111] Si crystallographic directions, with $|\mathbf{R}_0|=10, 20$ or 30 nm and standard deviation $σ_R=1, 2, 5$ or 10 nm. Our extensive theoretical results demonstrate the great challenge for a prescribed $J$ gate even with just a donor pair, a first step for any scalable Si-donor-based quantum computer.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2017

Intrinsic decoherence in isolated quantum systems

We study the intrinsic, disorder-induced decoherence of an isolated quantum system under its own dynamics. Specifically, we investigate the characteristic time scale (i.e., the decoherence time) associated with an interacting many-body system losing the memory of its initial state. To characterize the erasure of the initial state memory, we define a time scale, the intrinsic decoherence time, by thresholding the gradual decay of the disorder-averaged return probability. We demonstrate the system-size independence of the intrinsic decoherence time in different models, and we study its dependence on the disorder strength. We find that the intrinsic decoherence time increases monotonically as the disorder strength increases in accordance with the relaxation of locally measurable quantities. We investigate several interacting spin (e.g., Ising and Heisenberg) and fermion (e.g., Anderson and Aubry-André) models to obtain the intrinsic decoherence time as a function of disorder and interaction strength.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2017

Conductance spectroscopy of nontopological-topological superconductor junctions

We calculate the zero-temperature differential conductance $dI/dV$ of a voltage-biased one-dimensional junction between a nontopological and a topological superconductor for arbitrary junction transparency using the scattering matrix formalism. We consider two representative models for the topological superconductors: (i) spinful $p$-wave and (ii) $s$-wave with spin-orbit coupling and spin splitting. We verify that in the tunneling limit (small junction transparencies) where only single Andreev reflections contribute to the current, the conductance for voltages below the nontopological superconductor gap $Δ_s$ is zero and there are two symmetric conductance peaks appearing at $eV = \pm Δ_s$ with the quantized value $(4-π)2e^2/h$ due to resonant Andreev reflection from the Majorana zero mode. However, when the junction transparency is not small, there is a finite conductance for $e|V| < Δ_s$ arising from multiple Andreev reflections. The conductance at $eV = \pm Δ_s$ in this case is no longer quantized. In general, the conductance is particle-hole asymmetric except for sufficiently small transparencies. We further show that, for certain values of parameters, the tunneling conductance from a zero-energy conventional Andreev bound state can be made to mimic the conductance from a true Majorana mode.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2016

Quantum phases of disordered three-dimensional Majorana-Weyl fermions

The gapless Bogoliubov-de Gennes (BdG) quasiparticles of a clean three dimensional spinless $p_x+ip_y$ superconductor provide an intriguing example of a thermal Hall semimetal (ThSM) phase of Majorana-Weyl fermions in class D of the Altland-Zirnbauer symmetry classification; such a phase can support a large anomalous thermal Hall conductivity and protected surface Majorana-Fermi arcs at zero energy. We study the effect of quenched disorder on such a topological phase with both numerical and analytical methods. Using the kernel polynomial method, we compute the average and typical density of states for the BdG quasiparticles; based on this, we construct the disordered phase diagram. We show for infinitesimal disorder, the ThSM is converted into a diffusive thermal Hall metal (ThDM) due to rare statistical fluctuations. Consequently, the phase diagram of the disordered model only consists of ThDM and thermal insulating phases. Nonetheless, there is a cross-over at finite energies from a ThSM regime to a ThDM regime, and we establish the scaling properties of the avoided quantum critical point which marks this cross-over. Additionally, we show the existence of two types of thermal insulators: (i) a trivial thermal band insulator (ThBI) [or BEC phase] supporting only exponentially localized Lifshitz states (at low energy), and (ii) a thermal Anderson insulator (AI) at large disorder strengths. We determine the nature of the two distinct localization transitions between these two types of insulators and ThDM.We also discuss the experimental relevance of our results for three dimensional, time reversal symmetry breaking, triplet superconducting states.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2016

Weyl fermions with arbitrary monopole in magnetic fields: Landau levels, longitudinal magnetotransport, and density-wave ordering

We theoretically address the effects of strong magnetic fields in three-dimensional Weyl semimetals (WSMs) built out of Weyl nodes with a monopole charge $n$. For $n=1$, $2$, and $3$ we realize single, double, and triple WSM, respectively, and the monopole charge $n$ determines the integer topological invariant of the WSM. Within the linearized continuum description, the quasiparticle spectrum is then composed of Landau levels (LLs), containing exactly $n$ number of chiral zeroth Landau levels (ZLLs), irrespective of the orientation of the magnetic field. In the presence of strong backscattering, for example, (due to quenched disorder associated with random impurities), these systems generically give rise to longitudinal magnetotransport. Restricting ourselves to the quantum limit (and assuming only the subspace of the ZLLs to be partially filled) and mainly accounting for Gaussian impurities, we show that the longitudinal magnetoconductivity (LMC) in all members of the Weyl family displays a positive linear-$B$ scaling, when the field is applied along the axis that separates the Weyl nodes. But, in double and triple WSM, LMC displays a smooth crossover to a nonlinear $B$-dependence as the field is tilted away from such a high-symmetry direction. In addition, due to the enhanced density of states, the LL quantization can trigger instabilities toward the formation of translational symmetry breaking density-wave orderings for sufficiently weak interaction (BCS instability), which gaps out the ZLLs. Concomitantly as the temperature (magnetic field) is gradually decreased (increased) the LMC becomes negative. Thus WSMs with arbitrary monopole charge ($n$) can host an intriguing interplay of LL quantization, longitudinal magnetotransport (a possible manifestation of one-dimensional chiral or axial anomaly), and density-wave ordering, when placed in a strong magnetic field.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2016

Uncovering the hidden quantum critical point in disordered massless Dirac and Weyl semi-metals

We study the properties of the avoided or hidden quantum critical point (AQCP) in three dimensional Dirac and Weyl semi-metals in the presence of short range potential disorder. By computing the averaged density of states (along with its second and fourth derivative at zero energy) with the kernel polynomial method (KPM) we systematically tune the effective length scale that eventually rounds out the transition and leads to an AQCP. We show how to determine the strength of the avoidance, establishing that it is not controlled by the long wavelength component of the disorder. Instead, the amount of avoidance can be adjusted via the tails of the probability distribution of the local random potentials. A binary distribution with no tails produces much less avoidance than a Gaussian distribution. We introduce a double Gaussian distribution to interpolate between these two limits. As a result we are able to make the length scale of the avoidance sufficiently large so that we can accurately study the properties of the underlying transition (that is eventually rounded out), unambiguously identify its location, and provide accurate estimates of the critical exponents $ν=1.01\pm0.06$ and $z=1.50\pm0.04$. We also show that the KPM expansion order introduces an effective length scale that can also round out the transition in the scaling regime near the AQCP.

cond-mat.dis-nn↗

arXiv2016

Statistical Bubble Localization with Random Interactions

We study one-dimensional spinless fermions with random interactions, but without any on-site disorder. We find that random interactions generically stabilize a many-body localized phase, in spite of the completely extended single-particle degrees of freedom. In the large randomness limit, we construct "bubble-neck" eigenstates having a universal area-law entanglement entropy on average, with the number of volume-law states being exponentially suppressed. We argue that this statistical localization is beyond the phenomenological local-integrals-of-motion description of many-body localization. With exact diagonalization, we confirm the robustness of the many-body localized phase at finite randomness by investigating eigenstate properties such as level statistics, entanglement/participation entropies, and nonergodic quantum dynamics. At weak random interactions, the system develops a thermalization transition when the single-particle hopping becomes dominant.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2016

Dynamics of two coupled semiconductor spin qubits in a noisy environment

We theoretically consider the temporal dynamics of two coupled spin qubits (e.g., semiconductor quantum dots) driven by the inter-qubit spin-spin coupling. The presence of environmental noise (e.g., charge traps, nuclear spins, random magnetic impurities) is accounted for by including random magnetic field and random inter-qubit coupling terms in the Hamiltonian. Both Heisenberg coupling and Ising coupling between the spin qubits are considered, corresponding respectively to exchange and capacitive gates as appropriate for single spin and singlet-triplet semiconductor qubit systems, respectively. Both exchange (Heisenberg) and capacitive (Ising) coupling situations can be solved numerically exactly even in the presence of noise, leading to the key findings that (i) the steady-state return probability to the initial state remains close to unity in the presence of strong noise for many, but not all, starting spin configurations, and (ii) the return probability as a function of time is oscillatory with a characteristic noise-controlled decay toward the steady-state value. We also provide results for the magnetization dynamics of the coupled two-qubit system. Our predicted dynamics can be directly tested in the already existing semiconductor spin qubit setups providing insight into their coherent interaction dynamics. Retention of the initial state spin memory even in the presence of strong environmental noise has important implications for quantum computation using spin qubits.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2016

Fast control of semiconductor qubits beyond the rotating-wave approximation

We present a theoretical study of single-qubit operations by oscillatory fields on various semiconductor platforms. We explicitly show how to perform faster gate operations by going beyond the universally-used rotating wave approximation (RWA) regime, while using only two sinusoidal pulses. No complicated pulse shaping or optimal control sequences are required. We first show for specific published experiments how much error is currently incurred by implementing pulses designed using standard RWA. We then show that an even modest increase in gate speed would cause problems in using RWA for gate design in the singlet-triplet (ST) and resonant-exchange (RX) qubits. We discuss the extent to which analytically keeping higher orders in the perturbation theory would address the problem. More strikingly, we give a new prescription for gating with strong coupling far beyond the RWA regime. We perform numerical calculations for the phases and the durations of two consecutive pulses to realize the key Hadamard and $\fracπ{8}$ gates with coupling strengths up to several times the qubit splitting. Working in this manifestly non-RWA regime, the gate operation speeds up by two to three orders of magnitude.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2016

How to infer non-Abelian statistics and topological invariants from tunneling conductance properties of realistic Majorana nanowires

We consider a simple conceptual question with respect to Majorana zero modes in semiconductor nanowires: Can the measured non-ideal values of the zero-bias-conductance-peak in the tunneling experiments be used as a characteristic to predict the underlying topological nature of the proximity induced nanowire superconductivity? In particular, we define and calculate the topological visibility, which is a variation of the topological invariant associated with the scattering matrix of the system as well as the zero-bias-conductance-peak heights in the tunneling measurements, in the presence of dissipative broadening, using realistic nanowire parameters to connect the topological invariants with the zero bias tunneling conductance values. This dissipative broadening is present in both (the existing) tunneling measurements and also (any future) braiding experiments as an inevitable consequence of a finite braiding time. The connection between the topological visibility and the conductance allows us to obtain the visibility of realistic braiding experiments in nanowires, and to conclude that the current experimentally accessible systems with non-ideal zero bias conductance peaks may indeed manifest (with rather low visibility) non-Abelian statistics for the Majorana zero modes. In general, we find that large (small) superconducting gap (Majorana peak splitting) is essential for the manifestation of the non-Abelian braiding statistics, and in particular, a zero bias conductance value of around half the ideal quantized Majorana value should be sufficient for the manifestation of non-Abelian statistics in experimental nanowires.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗