Deterministic Quantum State Transfer and Generation of Remote Entanglement using Microwave Photons

Sharing information coherently between nodes of a quantum network is at the foundation of distributed quantum information processing. In this scheme, the computation is divided into subroutines and performed on several smaller quantum registers connected by classical and quantum channels. A direct quantum channel, which connects nodes deterministically, rather than probabilistically, is advantageous for fault-tolerant quantum computation because it reduces the threshold requirements and can achieve larger entanglement rates. Here, we implement deterministic state transfer and entanglement protocols between two superconducting qubits fabricated on separate chips. Superconducting circuits constitute a universal quantum node capable of sending, receiving, storing, and processing quantum information. Our implementation is based on an all-microwave cavity-assisted Raman process which entangles or transfers the qubit state of a transmon-type artificial atom to a time-symmetric itinerant single photon. We transfer qubit states at a rate of 50kHz using the emitted photons which are absorbed at the receiving node with a probability of 98.1±0.1% achieving a transfer process fidelity of 80.02±0.07%. We also prepare on demand remote entanglement with a fidelity as high as 78.9±0.1%. Our results are in excellent agreement with numerical simulations based on a master equation description of the system. This deterministic quantum protocol has the potential to be used as a backbone of surface code quantum error correction across different nodes of a cryogenic network to realize large-scale fault-tolerant quantum computation in the circuit quantum electrodynamic architecture.