I am going to post here all newly submitted articles on the arXiv related to superconducting circuits. If your article has been accidentally forgotten, feel free to contact me
13
Apr
2015
Meissner transmon qubit – architecture and characterization
We present a new type of transmon split-junction qubit which can be tuned by Meissner screening currents in the adjacent superconducting film electrodes. The best detected relaxation
time was of the order of 50 {\mu}s and the dephasing time about 70 {\mu}s. The achieved period of oscillation with magnetic field was much smaller than in usual SQUID-based transmon qubits, thus a strong effective field amplification has been realized. This Meissner qubit allows an efficient coupling to superconducting vortices. We present a quantitative analysis of the radiation-free energy relaxation in qubits coupled to Abrikosov vortices. The observation of coherent quantum oscillations provides strong evidence that vortices can exist in coherent quantum superpositions of different position states. According to our suggested model, the wave function collapse is defined by Caldeira-Leggett dissipation associated with viscous motion of the vortex cores.
Single-photon Resolved Cross-Kerr Interaction for Autonomous Stabilization of Photon-number States
Quantum states can be stabilized in the presence of intrinsic and environmental losses by either applying active feedback conditioned on an ancillary system or through reservoir engineering.
Reservoir engineering maintains a desired quantum state through a combination of drives and designed entropy evacuation. We propose and implement a quantum reservoir engineering protocol that stabilizes Fock states in a microwave cavity. This protocol is realized with a circuit quantum electrodynamics platform where a Josephson junction provides direct, nonlinear coupling between two superconducting waveguide cavities. The nonlinear coupling results in a single photon resolved cross-Kerr effect between the two cavities enabling a photon number dependent coupling to a lossy environment. The quantum state of the microwave cavity is discussed in terms of a net polarization and is analyzed by a measurement of its steady state Wigner function.
11
Apr
2015
Superconducting Circuitry for Quantum Electromechanical Systems
Superconducting systems have a long history of use in experiments that push the frontiers of mechanical sensing. This includes both applied and fundamental research, which at present
day ranges from quantum computing research and efforts to explore Planck-scale physics to fundamental studies on the nature of motion and the quantum limits on our ability to measure it. In this paper, we first provide a short history of the role of superconducting circuitry and devices in mechanical sensing, focusing primarily on efforts in the last decade to push the study of quantum mechanics to include motion on the scale of human-made structures. This background sets the stage for the remainder of the paper, which focuses on the development of quantum electromechanical systems (QEMS) that incorporate superconducting quantum bits (qubits), superconducting transmission line resonators and flexural nanomechanical elements. In addition to providing the motivation and relevant background on the physical behavior of these systems, we discuss our recent efforts to develop a particular type of QEMS that is based upon the Cooper-pair box (CPB) and superconducting coplanar waveguide (CPW) cavities, a system which has the potential to serve as a testbed for studying the quantum properties of motion in engineered systems.
09
Apr
2015
Violating Bell’s inequality with an artificial atom and a cat state in a cavity
The `Schr“odinger’s cat‘ thought experiment highlights the counterintuitive facet of quantum theory that entanglement can exist between microscopic and macroscopic
systems, producing a superposition of distinguishable states like the fictitious cat that is both alive and dead. The hallmark of entanglement is the detection of strong correlations between systems, for example by the violation of Bell’s inequality. Using the CHSH variant of the Bell test, this violation has been observed with photons, atoms, solid state spins, and artificial atoms in superconducting circuits. For larger, more distinguishable states, the conflict between quantum predictions and our classical expectations is typically resolved due to the rapid onset of decoherence. To investigate this reconciliation, one can employ a superposition of coherent states in an oscillator, known as a cat state. In contrast to discrete systems, one can continuously vary the size of the prepared cat state and therefore its dependence on decoherence. Here we demonstrate and quantify entanglement between an artificial atom and a cat state in a cavity, which we call a `Bell-cat‘ state. We use a circuit QED architecture, high-fidelity measurements, and real-time feedback control to violate Bell’s inequality without post-selection or corrections for measurement inefficiencies. Furthermore, we investigate the influence of decoherence by continuously varying the size of created Bell-cat states and characterize the entangled system by joint Wigner tomography. These techniques provide a toolset for quantum information processing with entangled qubits and resonators. While recent results have demonstrated a high level of control of such systems, this experiment demonstrates that information can be extracted efficiently and with high fidelity, a crucial requirement for quantum computing with resonators.
Storage and retrieval of microwave fields at the single-photon level in a spin ensemble
We report the storage of microwave pulses at the single-photon level in a spin-ensemble memory consisting of 1010 NV centers in a diamond crystal coupled to a superconducting LC resonator.
The energy of the signal, retrieved 100μs later by spin-echo techniques, reaches 0.3% of the energy absorbed by the spins, and this storage efficiency is quantitatively accounted for by simulations. This figure of merit is sufficient to envision first implementations of a quantum memory for superconducting qubits.
08
Apr
2015
Dual cut-off dc-tunable microwave low-pass filter on superconducting Nb microstrips with asymmetric nanogrooves
We present a dual cut-off, dc-tunable low-pass microwave filter on a superconducting Nb microstrip with uniaxial asymmetric nanogrooves. The frequency response of the device was measured
in the range 300\,KHz to 14\,GHz at different temperatures, magnetic fields, and dc current values. The microwave loss is most effectively reduced when the Abrikosov vortex lattice spatially matches the underlying washboard pinning landscape. The forward transmission coefficient S21(f) of the microstrip has a dc-tunable cut-off frequency fd which notably changes under dc bias reversal, due to the two different slope steepnesses of the pinning landscape. The device’s operation principle relies upon a crossover from the weakly dissipative response of vortices at low frequencies when they are driven over the grooves, to the strongly dissipative response at high frequencies when the vortices are oscillating within one groove. The filter’s cut-off frequency is the vortex depinning frequency tunable by the dc bias as it diminishes the pinning effect induced by the nanopattern. The reported results unveil an advanced microwave functionality of superconducting films with asymmetric (ratchet) pinning landscapes and are relevant for tuning the microwave loss in superconducting planar transmission lines.
07
Apr
2015
Violating the Bell-Leggett-Garg inequality with weak measurement of an entangled state
Since the inception of quantum mechanics, its validity as a complete description of reality has been challenged due to predictions that defy classical intuition. For many years it was
unclear whether predictions like entanglement and projective measurement represented real phenomena or artifacts of an incomplete model. Bell inequalities (BI) provided the first quantitative test to distinguish between quantum entanglement and a yet undiscovered classical hidden variable theory. The Leggett-Garg inequality (LGI) provides a similar test for projective measurement, and more recently has been adapted to include variable strength measurements to study the process of measurement itself. Here we probe the intersection of both entanglement and measurement through the lens of the hybrid Bell-Leggett-Garg inequality (BLGI). By correlating data from ancilla-based weak measurements and direct projective measurements, we for the first time quantify the effect of measurement strength on entanglement collapse. Violation of the BLGI, which we achieve only at the weakest measurement strengths, offers compelling evidence of the completeness of quantum mechanics while avoiding several loopholes common to previous experimental tests. This uniquely quantum result significantly constrains the nature of any possible classical theory of reality. Additionally, we demonstrate that with sufficient scale and fidelity, a universal quantum processor can be used to study richer fundamental physics.
Dispersive Response of a Disordered Superconducting Quantum Metamaterial
We consider a disordered quantum metamaterial formed by an array of superconducting flux qubits coupled to microwave photons in a cavity. We map the system on the Tavis-Cummings model
accounting for the disorder in frequencies of the qubits. The complex transmittance is calculated with the parameters taken from state-of-the-art experiments. We demonstrate that photon phase shift measurements allow to distinguish individual resonances in the metamaterial with up to 100 qubits, in spite of the decoherence spectral width being remarkably larger than the effective coupling constant. Our simulations are in agreement with the results of the recently reported experiment.
03
Apr
2015
Non-Hermitian Hamiltonian approach to the microwave transmission through one- dimensional qubit chain
We investigate the propagation of microwave photons in a one-dimensional waveguide interacting with a number of artificial atoms (qubits). Within the formalism of projection operators
and non-Hermitian Hamiltonian approach we develop a one-photon approximation scheme for the calculation of the transmission and reflection factors of the microwave signal in a waveguide which contains an arbitrary number \emph{N} of non-interacting qubits. It is shown that for identical qubits in the long-wave limit a coherent superradiance state is formed with the width being equal to the sum of the widths of spontaneous transitions of \emph{N} individual qubits.
01
Apr
2015
Autonomous quantum thermal machine for generating steady-state entanglement
We discuss a simple quantum thermal machine for the generation of steady-state entanglement between two interacting qubits. The machine is autonomous in the sense that it uses only
incoherent interactions with thermal baths, but no source of coherence or external control. By weakly coupling the qubits to thermal baths at different temperatures, inducing a heat current through the system, steady-state entanglement is generated far from thermal equilibrium. Finally, we discuss two possible implementations, using superconducting flux qubits or a semiconductor double quantum dot. Experimental prospects for steady-state entanglement are promising in both systems.