No Arabic abstract
The advanced nanoscale integration available in silicon complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology provides a key motivation for its use in spin-based quantum computing applications. Initial demonstrations of quantum dot formation and spin blockade in CMOS foundry-compatible devices are encouraging, but results are yet to match the control of individual electrons demonstrated in university-fabricated multi-gate designs. We show here that the charge state of quantum dots formed in a CMOS nanowire device can be sensed by using floating gates to electrostatically couple it to a remote single electron transistor (SET) formed in an adjacent nanowire. By biasing the nanowire and gates of the remote SET with respect to the nanowire hosting the quantum dots, we controllably form ancillary quantum dots under the floating gates, thus enabling the demonstration of independent control over charge transitions in a quadruple (2x2) quantum dot array. This device overcomes the limitations associated with measurements based on tunnelling transport through the dots and permits the sensing of all charge transitions, down to the last electron in each dot. We use effective mass theory to investigate the necessary optimization of the device parameters in order to achieve the tunnel rates required for spin-based quantum computation.
We report charge sensing measurements of a silicon metal-oxide-semiconductor quantum dot using a single-electron transistor as a charge sensor with dynamic feedback control. Using digitallycontrolled feedback, the sensor exhibits sensitive and robust detection of the charge state of the quantum dot, even in the presence of charge drifts and random charge rearrangements. The sensor enables the occupancy of the quantum dot to be probed down to the single electron level.
The interaction between electrons in arrays of electrostatically defined quantum dots is naturally described by a Fermi-Hubbard Hamiltonian. Moreover, the high degree of tunability of these systems make them a powerful platform to simulate different regimes of the Hubbard model. However, most quantum dot array implementations have been limited to one-dimensional linear arrays. In this letter, we present a square lattice unit cell of 2$times$2 quantum dots defined electrostatically in a AlGaAs/GaAs heterostructure using a double-layer gate technique. We probe the properties of the array using nearby quantum dots operated as charge sensors. We show that we can deterministically and dynamically control the charge occupation in each quantum dot in the single- to few-electron regime. Additionally, we achieve simultaneous individual control of the nearest-neighbor tunnel couplings over a range 0-40~$mu$eV. Finally, we demonstrate fast ($sim 1$~$mu$s) single-shot readout of the spin state of electrons in the dots, through spin-to-charge conversion via Pauli spin blockade. These advances pave the way to analog quantum simulations in two dimensions, not previously accessible in quantum dot systems.
We present a thermometry scheme to extract the temperature of a 2DEG by monitoring the charge occupation of a weakly tunnel-coupled thermometer quantum dot using a quantum point contact detector. Electronic temperatures between 97 mK and 307 mK are measured by this method with an accuracy of up to 3 mK, and agree with those obtained by measuring transport through a quantum dot. The thermometer does not pass a current through the 2DEG, and can be incorporated as an add-on to measure the temperature simultaneously with another operating device. Further, the tuning is independent of temperature.
Significant advances have been made towards fault-tolerant operation of silicon spin qubits, with single qubit fidelities exceeding 99.9%, several demonstrations of two-qubit gates based on exchange coupling, and the achievement of coherent single spin-photon coupling. Coupling arbitrary pairs of spatially separated qubits in a quantum register poses a significant challenge as most qubit systems are constrained to two dimensions (2D) with nearest neighbor connectivity. For spins in silicon, new methods for quantum state transfer should be developed to achieve connectivity beyond nearest-neighbor exchange. Here we demonstrate shuttling of a single electron across a linear array of 9 series-coupled Si quantum dots in ~50 ns via a series of pairwise interdot charge transfers. By progressively constructing more complex pulse sequences we perform parallel shuttling of 2 and 3 electrons at a time through the 9-dot array. These experiments establish that physical transport of single electrons is feasible in large silicon quantum dot arrays.
Measuring single-electron charge is one of the most fundamental quantum technologies. Charge sensing, which is an ingredient for the measurement of single spins or single photons, has been already developed for semiconductor gate-defined quantum dots, leading to intensive studies on the physics and the applications of single-electron charge, single-electron spin and photon-electron quantum interface. However, the technology has not yet been realized for self-assembled quantum dots despite their fascinating quantum transport phenomena and outstanding optical functionalities. In this paper, we report charge sensing experiments in self-assembled quantum dots. We choose two adjacent dots, and fabricate source and drain electrodes on each dot, in which either dot works as a charge sensor for the other target dot. The sensor dot current significantly changes when the number of electrons in the target dot changes by one, demonstrating single-electron charge sensing. We have also demonstrated real-time detection of single-electron tunnelling events. This charge sensing technique will be an important step towards combining efficient electrical readout of single-electron with intriguing quantum transport physics or advanced optical and photonic technologies developed for self-assembled quantum dots.