We aim to illuminate how the microscopic properties of a metal surface map to its electric-field noise characteristics. In our system, prolonged heat treatments of a metal film can induce a rise in the magnitude of the electric-field noise generated
by the surface of that film. We refer to this heat-induced rise in noise magnitude as a thermal transformation. The underlying physics of this thermal transformation process is explored through a series of heating, milling, and electron treatments performed on a single surface ion trap. Between these treatments, $^{40}$Ca$^+$ ions trapped 70 $mu$m above the surface of the metal are used as detectors to monitor the electric-field noise at frequencies close to 1 MHz. An Auger spectrometer is used to track changes in the composition of the contaminated metal surface. With these tools we investigate contaminant deposition, chemical reactions, and atomic restructuring as possible drivers of thermal transformations. The data suggest that the observed thermal transformations can be explained by atomic restructuring at the trap surface. We hypothesize that a rise in local atomic order increases surface electric-field noise in this system.
We demonstrate trapping of electrons in a millimeter-sized quadrupole Paul trap driven at 1.6~GHz in a room-temperature ultra-high vacuum setup. Cold electrons are introduced into the trap by ionization of atomic calcium via Rydberg states and stay c
onfined by microwave and static electric fields for several tens of milliseconds. A fraction of these electrons remain trapped longer and show no measurable loss for measurement times up to a second. Electronic excitation of the motion reveals secular frequencies which can be tuned over a range of several tens to hundreds of MHz. Operating a similar electron Paul trap in a cryogenic environment may provide a platform for all-electric quantum computing with trapped electron spin qubits.
We probe electric-field noise in a surface ion trap for ion-surface distances $d$ between 50 and 300 $mumathrm{m}$ in the normal and planar directions. We find the noise distance dependence to scale as $d^{-2.6}$ in our trap and a frequency dependenc
e which is consistent with $1/f$ noise. Simulations of the electric-field noise specific to our trap geometry provide evidence that we are not limited by technical noise sources. Our distance scaling data is consistent with a noise correlation length of about 100 $mumathrm{m}$ at the trap surface, and we discuss how patch potentials of this size would be modified by the electrode geometry.
We probe electric-field noise near the metal surface of an ion trap chip in a previously unexplored high-temperature regime. We observe a non-trivial temperature dependence with the noise amplitude at 1-MHz frequency saturating around 500~K. Measurem
ents of the noise spectrum reveal a $1/f^{alphaapprox1}$-dependence and a small decrease in $alpha$ between low and high temperatures. This behavior can be explained by considering noise from a distribution of thermally-activated two-level fluctuators with activation energies between 0.35~eV and 0.65~eV. Processes in this energy range may be relevant to understanding electric-field noise in ion traps; for example defect motion in the solid state and surface adsorbate binding energies. Studying these processes may aid in identifying the origin of excess electric-field noise in ion traps -- a major source of ion motional decoherence limiting the performance of surface traps as quantum devices.
We describe the design, fabrication, and operation of a novel surface-electrode Paul trap that produces a radio-frequency-null along the axis perpendicular to the trap surface. This arrangement enables control of the vertical trapping potential and c
onsequentially the ion-electrode distance via dc-electrodes only. We demonstrate confinement of single $^{40}$Ca$^+$ ions at heights between $50~mu$m and $300~mu$m above planar copper-coated aluminium electrodes. We investigate micromotion in the vertical direction and show cooling of both the planar and vertical motional modes into the ground state. This trap architecture provides a platform for precision electric-field noise detection, trapping of vertical ion strings without excess micromotion, and may have applications for scalable quantum computers with surface ion traps.
We propose a scheme to read out the spin of a single electron quantum bit in a surface Paul trap using oscillating magnetic field gradients. The readout sequence is composed of cooling, driving, amplification and detection of the electrons motion. We
study the scheme in the presence of noise and trap anharmonicities at liquid helium temperatures. An analysis of the the four procedures shows short measurement times ($25~mu$s) and high fidelities ($99.7%$) are achievable with realistic experimental parameters. Our scheme performs the function of fluorescence detection in ion trapping schemes, highlighting the potential to built all-electric quantum computers based on trapped electron spin qubits.
The electronic energy levels and optical transitions of a semiconductor quantum dot are subject to dynamics within the solid-state environment. In particular, fluctuating electric fields due to nearby charge traps or other quantum dots shift the tran
sition frequencies via the Stark effect. The environment dynamics are mapped directly onto the fluorescence under resonant excitation and diminish the prospects of quantum dots as sources of indistinguishable photons in optical quantum computing. Here, we present an analysis of resonance fluorescence fluctuations based on photon counting statistics which captures the underlying time-averaged electric field fluctuations of the local environment. The measurement protocol avoids dynamic feedback on the electric environment and the dynamics of the quantum dots nuclear spin bath by virtue of its resonant nature and by keeping experimental control parameters such as excitation frequency and external fields constant throughout. The method introduced here is experimentally undemanding.
Resonance fluorescence in the Heitler regime provides access to single photons with coherence well beyond the Fourier transform limit of the transition, and holds the promise to circumvent environment-induced dephasing common to all solid-state syste
ms. Here we demonstrate that the coherently generated single photons from a single self-assembled InAs quantum dot display mutual coherence with the excitation laser on a timescale exceeding 3 seconds. Exploiting this degree of mutual coherence we synthesize near-arbitrary coherent photon waveforms by shaping the excitation laser field. In contrast to post-emission filtering, our technique avoids both photon loss and degradation of the single photon nature for all synthesized waveforms. By engineering pulsed waveforms of single photons, we further demonstrate that separate photons generated coherently by the same laser field are fundamentally indistinguishable, lending themselves to creation of distant entanglement through quantum interference.
