arXiv subjects

Sean D. Barrett

Publications and source records attributed to Sean D. Barrett.

15 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2014

Logical Error Rate Scaling of the Toric Code

To date, a great deal of attention has focused on characterizing the performance of quantum error correcting codes via their thresholds, the maximum correctable physical error rate for a given noise model and decoding strategy. Practical quantum computers will necessarily operate below these thresholds meaning that other performance indicators become important. In this work we consider the scaling of the logical error rate of the toric code and demonstrate how, in turn, this may be used to calculate a key performance indicator. We use a perfect matching decoding algorithm to find the scaling of the logical error rate and find two distinct operating regimes. The first regime admits a universal scaling analysis due to a mapping to a statistical physics model. The second regime characterizes the behavior in the limit of small physical error rate and can be understood by counting the error configurations leading to the failure of the decoder. We present a conjecture for the ranges of validity of these two regimes and use them to quantify the overhead -- the total number of physical qubits required to perform error correction.

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arXiv2013

Topological Entanglement Entropy with a Twist

Defects in topologically ordered models have interesting properties that are reminiscent of the anyonic excitations of the models themselves. For example, dislocations in the toric code model are known as twists and possess properties that are analogous to Ising anyons. We strengthen this analogy by using the topological entanglement entropy as a diagnostic tool to identify properties of both defects and excitations in the toric code. Specifically, we show, through explicit calculation, that the toric code model including twists and dyon excitations has the same quantum dimensions, the same total quantum dimension, and the same fusion rules as an Ising anyon model.

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arXiv2013

Tradeoff between Leakage and Dephasing Errors in the Fluxonium Qubit

We present a tradeoff between leakage and pure dephasing errors for the fluxonium circuit. We show that in the insulating regime, i.e., when the persistent current flowing across the circuit is suppressed, the pure dephasing rate decreases exponentially as the impedance of the circuit is increased. In contrast to this exponential decrease, the qubit remains sufficiently anharmonic so that gates times can still be short, allowing for significant reduction in the computational error rates.

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arXiv2012

Long range failure-tolerant entanglement distribution

We introduce a protocol to distribute entanglement between remote parties. Our protocol is based on a chain of repeater stations, and exploits topological encoding to tolerate very high levels of defects and errors. The repeater stations may employ probabilistic entanglement operations which usually fail; ours is the first protocol to explicitly allow for technologies of this kind. Given an error rate between stations in excess of 10%, arbitrarily long range high fidelity entanglement distribution is possible even if the heralded failure rate within the stations is as high as 99%, providing that unheralded errors are low (order 0.01%).

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arXiv2010

Fault tolerant quantum computation with very high threshold for loss errors

Many proposals for fault tolerant quantum computation (FTQC) suffer detectable loss processes. Here we show that topological FTQC schemes, which are known to have high error thresholds, are also extremely robust against losses. We demonstrate that these schemes tolerate loss rates up to 24.9%, determined by bond percolation on a cubic lattice. Our numerical results show that these schemes retain good performance when loss and computational errors are simultaneously present.

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arXiv2010

Fully fault tolerant quantum computation with non-deterministic gates

In certain approaches to quantum computing the operations between qubits are non-deterministic and likely to fail. For example, a distributed quantum processor would achieve scalability by networking together many small components; operations between components should assumed to be failure prone. In the logical limit of this architecture each component contains only one qubit. Here we derive thresholds for fault tolerant quantum computation under such extreme paradigms. We find that computation is supported for remarkably high failure rates (exceeding 90%) providing that failures are heralded, meanwhile the rate of unknown errors should not exceed 2 in 10^4 operations.

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arXiv2009

Transitions in the computational power of thermal states for measurement-based quantum computation

We show that the usefulness of the thermal state of a specific spin-lattice model for measurement-based quantum computing exhibits a transition between two distinct "phases" - one in which every state is a universal resource for quantum computation, and another in which any local measurement sequence can be simulated efficiently on a classical computer. Remarkably, this transition in computational power does not coincide with any phase transition, classical or quantum, in the underlying spin-lattice model.

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arXiv2009

Quantum computation via measurements on the low-temperature state of a many-body system

We consider measurement-based quantum computation using the state of a spin-lattice system in equilibrium with a thermal bath and free to evolve under its own Hamiltonian. Any single qubit measurements disturb the system from equilibrium and, with adaptive measurements performed at a finite rate, the resulting dynamics reduces the fidelity of the computation. We show that it is possible to describe the loss in fidelity by a single quantum operation on the encoded quantum state that is independent of the measurement history. To achieve this simple description, we choose a particular form of spin-boson coupling to describe the interaction with the environment, and perform measurements periodically at a natural rate determined by the energy gap of the system. We found that an optimal cooling exists, which is a trade-off between keeping the system cool enough that the resource state remains close to the ground state, but also isolated enough that the cooling does not strongly interfere with the dynamics of the computation. For a sufficiently low temperature we obtain a fault-tolerant threshold for the couplings to the environment.

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arXiv2009

Thresholds for topological codes in the presence of loss

Many proposals for quantum information processing are subject to detectable loss errors. In this paper, we show that topological error correcting codes, which protect against computational errors, are also extremely robust against losses. We present analytical results showing the maximum tolerable loss rate is 50 %, which is determined by the square-lattice bond percolation threshold. This saturates the bound set by the no-cloning theorem. Our numerical results support this, and show a graceful trade-off between computational and loss errors.

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arXiv2009

Overcoming non-Markovian dephasing in single photon sources through post-selection

We study the effects of realistic dephasing environments on a pair of solid-state single-photon sources in the context of the Hong-Ou-Mandel dip. By means of solutions for the Markovian or exact non-Markovian dephasing dynamics of the sources, we show that the resulting loss of visibility depends crucially on the timing of photon detection events. Our results demonstrate that the effective visibility can be improved via temporal post-selection, and also that time-resolved interference can be a useful probe of the interaction between the emitter and its host environment.

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arXiv2007

Strategies for the preparation of large cluster states using non-deterministic gates

The cluster state model for quantum computation has paved the way for schemes that allow scalable quantum computing, even when using non-deterministic quantum gates. Here the initial step is to prepare a large entangled state using non-deterministic gates. A key question in this context is the relative efficiencies of different `strategies', i.e. in what order should the non-deterministic gates be applied, in order to maximize the size of the resulting cluster states? In this paper we consider this issue in the context of `large' cluster states. Specifically, we assume an unlimited resource of qubits and ask what the steady state rate at which `large' clusters are prepared from this resource is, given an entangling gate with particular characteristics. We measure this rate in terms of the number of entangling gate operations that are applied. Our approach works for a variety of different entangling gate types, with arbitrary failure probability. Our results indicate that strategies whereby one preferentially bonds together identical qubits are considerably more efficient than those in which one does not. Additionally, compared to earlier analytic results, our numerical study offers substantially improved resource scaling.

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arXiv2005

Repeat-Until-Success quantum computing using stationary and flying qubits

We introduce an architecture for robust and scalable quantum computation using both stationary qubits (e.g. single photon sources made out of trapped atoms, molecules, ions, quantum dots, or defect centers in solids) and flying qubits (e.g. photons). Our scheme solves some of the most pressing problems in existing non-hybrid proposals, which include the difficulty of scaling conventional stationary qubit approaches, and the lack of practical means for storing single photons in linear optics setups. We combine elements of two previous proposals for distributed quantum computing, namely the efficient photon-loss tolerant build up of cluster states by Barrett and Kok [Phys. Rev. A 71, 060310(R) (2005)] with the idea of Repeat-Until-Success (RUS) quantum computing by Lim et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 95, 030505 (2005)]. This idea can be used to perform eventually deterministic two-qubit logic gates on spatially separated stationary qubits via photon pair measurements. Under non-ideal conditions, where photon loss is a possibility, the resulting gates can still be used to build graph states for one-way quantum computing. In this paper, we describe the RUS method, present possible experimental realizations, and analyse the generation of graph states.

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arXiv2005

Quantum Computing with Spin Qubits Interacting Through Delocalized Excitons: Overcoming Hole Mixing

As a candidate scheme for controllably coupled qubits, we consider two quantum dots, each doped with a single electron. The spin of the electron defines our qubit basis and trion states can be created by using polarized light; we show that the form of the excited trion depends on the state of the qubit. By using the Luttinger-Kohn Hamiltonian we calculate the form of these trion states in the presence of light-heavy hole mixing, and show that they can interact through both the Förster transfer and static dipole-dipole interactions. Finally, we demonstrate that by using chirped laser pulses, it is possible to perform a two-qubit gate in this system by adiabatically following the eigenstates as a function of laser detuning. These gates are robust in that they operate with any realistic degree of hole mixing, and for either type of trion-trion coupling.

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arXiv2005

Preparing multi-partite entanglement of photons and matter qubits

We show how to make event-ready multi-partite entanglement between qubits which may be encoded on photons or matter systems. Entangled states of matter systems, which can also act as single photon sources, can be generated using the entangling operation presented in quant-ph/0408040. We show how to entangle such sources with photon qubits, which may be encoded in the dual rail, polarization or time-bin degrees of freedom. We subsequently demonstrate how projective measurements of the matter qubits can be used to create entangled states of the photons alone. The state of the matter qubits is inherited by the generated photons. Since the entangling operation can be used to generate cluster states of matter qubits for quantum computing, our procedure enables us to create any (entangled) photonic quantum state that can be written as the outcome of a quantum computer.

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arXiv2005

Efficient high-fidelity quantum computation using matter qubits and linear optics

We propose a practical, scalable, and efficient scheme for quantum computation using spatially separated matter qubits and single photon interference effects. The qubit systems can be NV-centers in diamond, Pauli-blockade quantum dots with an excess electron or trapped ions with optical transitions, which are each placed in a cavity and subsequently entangled using a double-heralded single-photon detection scheme. The fidelity of the resulting entanglement is extremely robust against the most important errors such as detector loss, spontaneous emission, and mismatch of cavity parameters. We demonstrate how this entangling operation can be used to efficiently generate cluster states of many qubits, which, together with single qubit operations and readout, can be used to implement universal quantum computation. Existing experimental parameters indicate that high fidelity clusters can be generated with a moderate constant overhead.

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