No Arabic abstract
We study quantum state tomography, entanglement detection, and channel noise reconstruction of propagating quantum microwaves via dual-path methods. The presented schemes make use of the following key elements: propagation channels, beam splitters, linear amplifiers, and field quadrature detectors. Remarkably, our methods are tolerant to the ubiquitous noise added to the signals by phase-insensitive microwave amplifiers. Furthermore, we analyze our techniques with numerical examples and experimental data, and compare them with the scheme developed in Eichler $et$ $al$ (2011 Phys. Rev. Lett. 106 220503; 2011 Phys. Rev. Lett. 107 113601), based on a single path. Our methods provide key toolbox components that may pave the way towards quantum microwave teleportation and communication protocols.
Propagating quantum microwaves have been proposed and successfully implemented to generate entanglement, thereby establishing a promising platform for the realisation of a quantum communication channel. However, the implementation of quantum teleportation with photons in the microwave regime is still absent. At the same time, recent developments in the field show that this key protocol could be feasible with current technology, which would pave the way to boost the field of microwave quantum communication. Here, we discuss the feasibility of a possible implementation of microwave quantum teleportation in a realistic scenario with losses. Furthermore, we propose how to implement quantum repeaters in the microwave regime without using photodetection, a key prerequisite to achieve long distance entanglement distribution.
The ability to control and measure the temperature of propagating microwave modes down to very low temperatures is indispensable for quantum information processing, and may open opportunities for studies of heat transport at the nanoscale, also in the quantum regime. Here we propose and experimentally demonstrate primary thermometry of propagating microwaves using a transmon-type superconducting circuit. Our device operates continuously, with a sensitivity down to $4times 10^{-4}$ photons/$sqrt{mbox{Hz}}$ and a bandwidth of 40 MHz. We measure the thermal occupation of the modes of a highly attenuated coaxial cable in a range of 0.001 to 0.4 thermal photons, corresponding to a temperature range from 35 mK to 210 mK at a frequency around 5 GHz. To increase the radiation temperature in a controlled fashion, we either inject calibrated, wideband digital noise, or heat the device and its environment. This thermometry scheme can find applications in benchmarking and characterization of cryogenic microwave setups, temperature measurements in hybrid quantum systems, and quantum thermodynamics.
We develop the theory of a metamaterial composed of an array of discrete quantum absorbers inside a one-dimensional waveguide that implements a high-efficiency microwave photon detector. A basic design consists of a few metastable superconducting nanocircuits spread inside and coupled to a one-dimensional waveguide in a circuit QED setup. The arrival of a {it propagating} quantum microwave field induces an irreversible change in the population of the internal levels of the absorbers, due to a selective absorption of photon excitations. This design is studied using a formal but simple quantum field theory, which allows us to evaluate the single-photon absorption efficiency for one and many absorber setups. As an example, we consider a particular design that combines a coplanar coaxial waveguide with superconducting phase qubits, a natural but not exclusive playground for experimental implementations. This work and a possible experimental realization may stimulate the possible arrival of all-optical quantum information processing with propagating quantum microwaves, where a microwave photodetector could play a key role.
We propose a simple circuit quantum electrodynamics (QED) experiment to test the generation of entanglement between two superconducting qubits. Instead of the usual cavity QED picture, we study qubits which are coupled to an open transmission line and get entangled by the exchange of propagating photons. We compute their dynamics using a full quantum field theory beyond the rotating-wave approximation and explore a variety of regimes which go from a weak coupling to the recently introduced ultrastrong coupling regime. Due to the existence of single photons traveling along the line with finite speed, our theory shows a light cone dividing the spacetime in two different regions. In one region, entanglement may only arise due to correlated vacuum fluctuations, while in the other the contribution from exchanged photons shows up.
We propose a prime factorizer operated in a framework of quantum annealing (QA). The idea is inverse operation of a multiplier implemented with QA-based Boolean logic circuits. We designed the QA machine on an application-specific-annealing-computing architecture which efficiently increases available hardware budgets at the cost of restricted functionality. The invertible operation of QA logic gates consisting of superconducting flux qubits was confirmed by circuit simulation with classical noise sources. The circuits were implemented and fabricated by using superconducting integrated circuit technologies with Nb/AlOx/Nb Josephson junctions. We also propose a 2.5Dimensional packaging scheme of a qubit-chip/interpose /package-substrate structure for realizing practically large-scale QA systems.