Events

Developing a Large-Scale, Programmable Trapped Ion Quantum Simulator with In Situ Mid-Circuit Measurement and Reset

Quantum simulators are a valuable resource for studying complex many-body systems. With their ability to provide near-term advantages, analog quantum simulators show great promise. During the course of my PhD, my aim was to construct a large-scale trapped-ion based analog quantum simulator with several objectives in mind: controllability, minimal external decoherence, an expandable toolkit for quantum simulations, enhanced stability through robust design practices, and pushing the boundaries of error correction.

One of my key achievements is the demonstration of high-fidelity preservation of an “asset” ion qubit while simultaneously resetting or measuring a neighboring “process” qubit located a few microns away. My results show that I achieve a probability of accidental measurement of the asset qubit below 1×10−3 while resetting the process qubit. Similarly, when applying a detection beam on the same neighboring qubit to achieve fast detection times, the probability remains below 4 × 10−3 at a distance of 6 μm. These low probabilities correspond to the preservation of the quantum state of the asset qubit with fidelities above 99.9% for state reset and 99.6% for state measurement.

Additionally, I successfully conduct a dissipative many-body cooling experiment based on reservoir engineering by leveraging site-selective mid-circuit resets. I propose and optimize a protocol utilizing reservoir engineering to efficiently cool the spin state of a subsystem coupled to a reservoir with controlled dissipation. Through analog quantum simulation of this protocol, I am able to demonstrate the lowering of energy within the subsystem.

Furthermore, I thoroughly discuss the design, fabrication, and assembly of a large-scale trapped ion quantum simulator called the Blade trap as part of my PhD work. I highlight the specific design considerations taken to isolate the trapped ions from external disturbances that could introduce errors. Comprehensive testing procedures are presented to evaluate the performance and stability of the Blade trap, which are crucial for assessing the effectiveness of the design. An important milestone I achieve is reaching a base pressure below 9E-13 mbar, demonstrating the successful implementation of techniques to maintain an extremely low-pressure environment ideal for quantum simulation.

Measuring Quantum Correlations of Polarization, Spatial Mode, and Energy-Time Entangled Photon Pairs

Optical quantum technologies have found applications in all facets of quantum information. Single photons are actively being researched for quantum computation, communication, and sensing, due to their robustness against decoherence stemming from their minimal interaction with the environment. For communication and networking applications, specifically, photons are lauded for their speed and coherence over long distances. While clear benefits arise from the lack of photon-environment interaction, measurement and control of all photonic degrees of freedom is made challenging. Each degree of freedom, be it polarization, space, time, or frequency, comes with its own advantages and drawbacks. The potential that single photons bring to future quantum technologies may only be realized by full control over each of these properties of light.

Analog Quantum Simulation via Parametric Interactions in Superconducting Circuits

While universal quantum computers are still years away from being used for simulating complicated quantum systems, analog quantum simulators have become an increasingly attractive approach to studying classically intractable quantum systems in condensed matter physics, chemistry, and high-energy physics. In this dissertation, we utilize superconducting cavities and qubits to establish analog quantum simulation (AQS) platforms to study systems of interest. 

An approach of AQS that has gained interest lately is the use of photonic lattices to simulate popular lattice models. These systems consist of an array of cavities or resonators arranged on a lattice with some couplings graph between modes. We propose an in situ programmable platform based on a superconducting multimode cavity. The unique design of the cavity allows us to program arbitrarily connected lattices where the coupling strength and phase of each individual coupling are highly programmable via parametrically activated interactions. Virtually any quadratic bosonic Hamiltonian can be realized in our platform with a straightforward pumping scheme.

The effectiveness of the cavity-based AQS platform was demonstrated by the experimental simulation of two interesting models. First, we simulated the effect of a fictitious magnetic field on a 4-site plaquette of a bosonic Creutz ladder, a paradigmatic topological model from high-energy physics.  Under the right magnetic field conditions, we observed topological features such as emergent edge states and localized soliton states. The platform's ability is further explored by introducing pairing (downconversion) terms to simulate the Bosonic Kitaev chain (BKC), the bosonic version of the famous Fermionic Kitaev chain that hosts Majorana fermions. We observe interesting properties of BKC, such as chiral transport and sensitivity to boundary conditions.  

In the final part of the dissertation, we propose and implement a parametrically activated 3-qubit interaction in a circuit QED architecture as the simplest building block to simulate lattice gauge theories (LGT). LGT is a framework for studying gauge theories in discretized space-time, often used when perturbative methods fail.   The gauge symmetries lead to conservation laws, such as Gauss's law in electrodynamics, which impose constraints tying the configuration of the gauge field to the configuration of ''matter'' sites.  Therefore, any quantum simulation approach for LGTs must maintain these conservation laws, with one strategy in AQS being to build them in at the hardware level.  Here, the gauge constraints are explicitly included using a higher-order parametric process between three qubits. The simplest 2-site U(1) LGT building block is realized with two qubits as matter sites and a third qubit as the gauge field mediating the matter-matter interaction, which is crucial to maintain the symmetry of U(1) LGTs.  

An estimation theoretic approach to quantum realizability problems

This thesis seeks to develop a general method for solving so-called quantum realizability problems, which are questions of the following form under which conditions does there exists a quantum state exhibiting a given collection of properties? The approach adopted by this thesis is to utilize mathematical techniques previously developed for the related problem of property estimation which is concerned with learning or estimating the properties of an unknown quantum state. Our primary result is to recognize a correspondence between (i) property values which are realized by some quantum state, and (ii) property values which are occasionally produced as estimates of a generic quantum state. In Chapter 3, we review the concepts of stability and norm minimization from geometric invariant theory and non-commutative optimization theory for the purposes of characterizing the flow of a quantum state under the action of a reductive group.

In particular, we discover that most properties of quantum states are related to the gradient of this flow, also known as the moment map. Afterwards, Chapter 4 demonstrates how to estimate the value of the moment map of a quantum state by performing a covariant quantum measurement on a large number of identical copies of the quantum state. These measurement schemes for estimating the moment map of a quantum state arise naturally from the decomposition of a large tensor-power representation into its irreducible sub-representations.

Then, in Chapter 5, we prove an exact correspondence between the realizability of a moment map value on one hand and the asymptotic likelihood it is produced as an estimate on the other hand. In particular, by composing these estimation schemes, we derive necessary and sufficient conditions for the existence of a quantum state jointly realizing any finite collection of moment maps. Finally, in Chapter 6 we apply these techniques to the quantum marginals problem which aims to characterize precisely the relationships between the marginal density operators describing the various subsystems of composite quantum state. We make progress toward an analytic solution to the quantum marginals problem by deriving a complete hierarchy of necessary inequality constraints.

IQC Seminar - Ian George, UIUC

As quantum networks approach real life implementation, a theoretical understanding of their limitations becomes practically important. In this talk, I will discuss recent works with my collaborators where we characterize the ability to prepare a target quantum state over simple networks using local operations (LO) and limited correlated resources in the one-shot setting.

Modeling and managing noise in quantum error correction 

Simulating a quantum system to full accuracy is very costly and often impossible as we do not know the exact dynamics of a given system. In particular, the dynamics of measurement noise are not well understood. For this reason, and especially in the context of quantum error correction, where we are studying a larger system with branching outcomes due to syndrome measurement, studies often assume a probabilistic Pauli (or Weyl) noise model on the system with probabilistically misreported outcomes for the measurements. In this thesis, we explore methods to decrease the computational complexity of simulating encoded memory channels by deriving conditions under which effective channels are equivalent up to logical operations. Leveraging this method allows for a significant reduction in computational complexity when simulating quantum error correcting codes. We then propose methods to enforce a model consistent with the typical assumptions of stochastic Pauli (or Weyl) noise with probabilistically misreported measurement outcomes. First, via a new protocol we call measurement randomized compiling, which enforces an average noise on measurements wherein measure- ment outcomes are probabilistically misreported. Then, by another new protocol we call logical randomized compiling, which enforces the same model on syndrome measurements and a probabilistic Pauli (or Weyl) noise model on all other operations (including idling). Together, these results enable more efficient simulation of quantum error correction systems by enforcing effective noise of a form which is easier to model and by reducing the simulation overhead further via symmetries. The enforced effective noise model is additionally consistent with standard error correction procedures and enables techniques founded upon the standard assumptions to be applied in any setting where our protocols are simultaneously applied. 

Quantum Nano Centre (QNC) Room 0101, 200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON

IQC Colloquium, Harry Buhrman - QuSoft

One of the major challenges in computer science is to establish lower bounds on the resources, usually time, that are needed to solve computational problems. This holds in particular for computational problems that appear in practise. One way towards dealing with this situation is the study of fine- grained complexity where we use special reductions to prove time lower bounds for many diverse problems based on the conjectured hardness of some key problems.

Quantum Nano Centre (QNC) Room 1201, 200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON

IQC Seminar Featuring Jasminder Sidhu, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow

A network of quantum technologies will herald improvements to applications ranging from communications, sensing, and computing. Finite resources available in practical implementations and losses are two prominent limitations to the global scale-up of distributed quantum technologies. This can lead to a significant departure in the expected performance of these applications and limits their range. In this talk, I will highlight recent work that looks into the impact of finite resources to determine practical performances in satellite-based quantum communications. I will also introduce recent proposals that leverage space-based quantum repeaters to extend the range of quantum networks.

IQC Seminar - Stefanie Haeusler, Department of Optical Satellite Links, Institute of Communications and Navigation, Germany

Quantum Nano Centre, 200 University Ave W, Room QNC 1201 Waterloo, ON, CA N2L 3G1

Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) is a promising method to guarantee future-proof, information theoretic security. Since optical fibers have an exponential loss with distance, satellite-based QKD solutions are being developed in order to realize long-distance links. Therefore, Optical Ground Stations for QKD (QKD-OGS) need to be designed to enable quantum communication with satellites. Different link configurations will result in different integration options of the QKD-OGS in the terrestrial fiber network and therefore impact its performance. Applicable integration options are identified and discussed.

Kim de Laat, University of Waterloo

Quantum Nano Centre (QNC) Room 0101, 200 University Avenue West, Waterloo, ON

The field of quantum computing has a unique opportunity to pre-empt many of the inequities that have riddled AI and computer science. But radical technologies require new, radical solutions. In this talk, I take issue with the leaky pipeline metaphor as a way of structuring policy interventions concerning inequality in STEM fields. I outline three reasons why overreliance on the leaky pipeline metaphor is problematic: (1) it does not accurately represent the phenomenon it is meant to describe; (2) it is incomplete; and (3) it does not capture the full heterogeneity of experiences with inequality in STEM disciplines. I conclude the talk by sharing feedback from the quantum technology community concerning potential pitfalls in the pursuit of equity in quantum, and what we can do about it.