arXiv subjects

Shibo Xu

Publications and source records attributed to Shibo Xu.

24 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2023

Digital simulation of non-Abelian anyons with 68 programmable superconducting qubits

Non-Abelian anyons are exotic quasiparticle excitations hosted by certain topological phases of matter. They break the fermion-boson dichotomy and obey non-Abelian braiding statistics: their interchanges yield unitary operations, rather than merely a phase factor, in a space spanned by topologically degenerate wavefunctions. They are the building blocks of topological quantum computing. However, experimental observation of non-Abelian anyons and their characterizing braiding statistics is notoriously challenging and has remained elusive hitherto, in spite of various theoretical proposals. Here, we report an experimental quantum digital simulation of projective non-Abelian anyons and their braiding statistics with up to 68 programmable superconducting qubits arranged on a two-dimensional lattice. By implementing the ground states of the toric-code model with twists through quantum circuits, we demonstrate that twists exchange electric and magnetic charges and behave as a particular type of non-Abelian anyons, i.e., the Ising anyons. In particular, we show experimentally that these twists follow the fusion rules and non-Abelian braiding statistics of the Ising type, and can be explored to encode topological logical qubits. Furthermore, we demonstrate how to implement both single- and two-qubit logic gates through applying a sequence of elementary Pauli gates on the underlying physical qubits. Our results demonstrate a versatile quantum digital approach for simulating non-Abelian anyons, offering a new lens into the study of such peculiar quasiparticles.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Observation of many-body Fock space dynamics in two dimensions

Quantum many-body simulation provides a straightforward way to understand fundamental physics and connect with quantum information applications. However, suffering from exponentially growing Hilbert space size, characterization in terms of few-body probes in real space is often insufficient to tackle challenging problems such as quantum critical behavior and many-body localization (MBL) in higher dimensions. Here, we experimentally employ a new paradigm on a superconducting quantum processor, exploring such elusive questions from a Fock space view: mapping the many-body system onto an unconventional Anderson model on a complex Fock space network of many-body states. By observing the wave packet propagating in Fock space and the emergence of a statistical ergodic ensemble, we reveal a fresh picture for characterizing representative many-body dynamics: thermalization, localization, and scarring. In addition, we observe a quantum critical regime of anomalously enhanced wave packet width and deduce a critical point from the maximum wave packet fluctuations, which lend support for the two-dimensional MBL transition in finite-sized systems. Our work unveils a new perspective of exploring many-body physics in Fock space, demonstrating its practical applications on contentious MBL aspects such as criticality and dimensionality. Moreover, the entire protocol is universal and scalable, paving the way to finally solve a broader range of controversial many-body problems on future larger quantum devices.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Experimental quantum adversarial learning with programmable superconducting qubits

Quantum computing promises to enhance machine learning and artificial intelligence. Different quantum algorithms have been proposed to improve a wide spectrum of machine learning tasks. Yet, recent theoretical works show that, similar to traditional classifiers based on deep classical neural networks, quantum classifiers would suffer from the vulnerability problem: adding tiny carefully-crafted perturbations to the legitimate original data samples would facilitate incorrect predictions at a notably high confidence level. This will pose serious problems for future quantum machine learning applications in safety and security-critical scenarios. Here, we report the first experimental demonstration of quantum adversarial learning with programmable superconducting qubits. We train quantum classifiers, which are built upon variational quantum circuits consisting of ten transmon qubits featuring average lifetimes of 150 $μ$s, and average fidelities of simultaneous single- and two-qubit gates above 99.94% and 99.4% respectively, with both real-life images (e.g., medical magnetic resonance imaging scans) and quantum data. We demonstrate that these well-trained classifiers (with testing accuracy up to 99%) can be practically deceived by small adversarial perturbations, whereas an adversarial training process would significantly enhance their robustness to such perturbations. Our results reveal experimentally a crucial vulnerability aspect of quantum learning systems under adversarial scenarios and demonstrate an effective defense strategy against adversarial attacks, which provide a valuable guide for quantum artificial intelligence applications with both near-term and future quantum devices.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2022

Many-body Hilbert space scarring on a superconducting processor

Quantum many-body scarring (QMBS) -- a recently discovered form of weak ergodicity breaking in strongly-interacting quantum systems -- presents opportunities for mitigating thermalization-induced decoherence in quantum information processsing. However, the existing experimental realizations of QMBS are based on kinetically-constrained systems where an emergent dynamical symmetry "shields" such states from the thermalizing bulk of the spectrum. Here, we experimentally realize a distinct kind of QMBS phenomena by approximately decoupling a part of the many-body Hilbert space in the computational basis. Utilizing a programmable superconducting processor with 30 qubits and tunable couplings, we realize Hilbert space scarring in a non-constrained model in different geometries, including a linear chain as well as a quasi-one-dimensional comb geometry. By performing full quantum state tomography on 4-qubit subsystems, we provide strong evidence for QMBS states by measuring qubit population dynamics, quantum fidelity and entanglement entropy following a quench from initial product states. Our experimental findings broaden the realm of QMBS mechanisms and pave the way to exploiting correlations in QMBS states for applications in quantum information technology.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2021

Observation of a symmetry-protected topological time crystal with superconducting qubits

We report the observation of a symmetry-protected topological time crystal, which is implemented with an array of programmable superconducting qubits. Unlike the time crystals reported in previous experiments, where spontaneous breaking of the discrete time translational symmetry occurs for local observables throughout the whole system, the topological time crystal observed in our experiment breaks the time translational symmetry only at the boundaries and has trivial dynamics in the bulk. More concretely, we observe robust long-lived temporal correlations and sub-harmonic temporal response for the edge spins up to 40 driving cycles. We demonstrate that the sub-harmonic response is independent of whether the initial states are random product states or symmetry-protected topological states, and experimentally map out the phase boundary between the time crystalline and thermal phases. Our work paves the way to exploring peculiar non-equilibrium phases of matter emerged from the interplay between topology and localization as well as periodic driving, with current noisy intermediate-scale quantum processors.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2020

Stark many-body localization on a superconducting quantum processor

Quantum emulators, owing to their large degree of tunability and control, allow the observation of fine aspects of closed quantum many-body systems, as either the regime where thermalization takes place or when it is halted by the presence of disorder. The latter, dubbed many-body localization (MBL) phenomenon, describes the non-ergodic behavior that is dynamically identified by the preservation of local information and slow entanglement growth. Here, we provide a precise observation of this same phenomenology in the case the onsite energy landscape is not disordered, but rather linearly varied, emulating the Stark MBL. To this end, we construct a quantum device composed of thirty-two superconducting qubits, faithfully reproducing the relaxation dynamics of a non-integrable spin model. Our results describe the real-time evolution at sizes that surpass what is currently attainable by exact simulations in classical computers, signaling the onset of quantum advantage, thus bridging the way for quantum computation as a resource for solving out-of-equilibrium many-body problems.

quant-ph↗