Martin Laforest

Experimental implementation of a discrete-time quantum random walk on an NMR quantum-information processor

We present an experimental implementation of the coined discrete-time quantum walk on a square using a three-qubit liquid-state nuclear-magnetic-resonance (NMR) quantum-information processor (QIP). Contrary to its classical counterpart, we observe complete interference after certain steps and a periodicity in the evolution. Complete state tomography has been performed for each of the eight steps, making a full period. The results have extremely high fidelity with the expected states and show clearly the effects of quantum interference in the walk. We also show and discuss the importance of choosing a molecule with a natural Hamiltonian well suited to a NMR QIP by implementing the same algorithm on a second molecule. Finally, we show experimentally that decoherence after each step makes the statistics of the quantum walk tend to that of the classical random walk.

Symmetrized characterization of noisy quantum processes.

A major goal of developing high-precision control of many-body quantum systems is to realize their potential as quantum computers. A substantial obstacle to this is the extreme fragility of quantum systems to “decoherence” from environmental noise and other control limitations. Although quantum computation is possible if the noise affecting the quantum system satisfies certain conditions, existing methods for noise characterization are intractable for present multibody systems. We introduce a technique based on symmetrization that enables direct experimental measurement of some key properties of the decoherence affecting a quantum system. Our method reduces the number of experiments required from exponential to polynomial in the number of subsystems. The technique is demonstrated for the optimization of control over nuclear spins in the solid state.

Liquid-state nuclear magnetic resonance as a testbed for developing quantum control methods

In building a quantum information processor (QIP), the challenge is to coherently control a large quantum system well enough to perform an arbitrary quantum algorithm and to be able to correct errors induced by decoherence. Nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) QIPs offer an excellent test-bed on which to develop and benchmark tools and techniques to control quantum systems. Two main issues to consider when designing control methods are accuracy and efficiency, for which two complementary approaches have been developed so far to control qubit registers with liquid-state NMR methods. The first applies optimal control theory to numerically optimize the control fields to implement unitary operations on low dimensional systems with high fidelity. The second technique is based on the efficient optimization of a sequence of imperfect control elements so that implementation of a full quantum algorithm is possible while minimizing error accumulation. This article summarizes our work in implementing both of these methods. Furthermore, we show that taken together, they form a basis to design quantum-control methods for a block-architecture QIP so that large system size is not a barrier to implementing optimal control techniques.

Randomized benchmarking of single- and multi-qubit control in liquid-state NMR quantum information processing

Being able to quantify the level of coherent control in a proposed device implementing a quantum information processor (QIP) is an important task for both comparing different devices and assessing a devices prospects with regards to achieving fault-tolerant quantum control. We implement in a liquid-state nuclear magnetic resonance QIP the randomized benchmarking protocol presented by Knill et al (2008 Phys. Rev. A 77 012307). We report an error per randomized π/2 pulse of 1.3±0.1×10−4 with a single-qubit QIP and show an experimentally relevant error model where the randomized benchmarking gives a signature fidelity decay which is not possible to interpret as a single error per gate. We explore and experimentally investigate multi-qubit extensions of this protocol and report an average error rate for one- and two-qubit gates of 4.7±0.3×10−3 for a three-qubit QIP. We estimate that these error rates are still not decoherence limited and thus can be improved with modifications to the control hardware and software.

Robust quantum communication using a polarization-entangled photon pair

Noise and imperfection of realistic devices are major obstacles for implementing quantum cryptography. In particular, birefringence in optical fibers leads to decoherence of qubits encoded in photon polarization. We show how to overcome this problem by doing single qubit quantum communication without a shared spatial reference frame and precise timing. Quantum information will be encoded in pairs of photons using tag operations, which corresponds to the time delay of one of the polarization modes. This method is robust against the phase instability of the interferometers despite the use of time bins. Moreover synchronized clocks are not required in the ideal no photon loss case as they are necessary only to label the different encoded qubits.

Direct observation of quantum criticality in Ising spin chains

We use NMR quantum simulators to study antiferromagnetic Ising spin chains undergoing quantum phase transitions. Taking advantage of the sensitivity of the systems near criticality, we detect the critical points of the transitions using a direct measurement of the Loschmidt echo. We test our simulators for spin chains of even and odd numbers of spins, and compare the experimental results to theoretical predictions.

Using error correction to determine the noise model

Quantum error correcting codes have been shown to have the ability of making quantum information resilient against noise. Here we show that we can use quantum error correcting codes as diagnostics to characterize noise. The experiment is based on a three-bit quantum error correcting code carried out on a three-qubit nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) quantum information processor. Utilizing both engineered and natural noise, the degree of correlations present in the noise affecting a two-qubit subsystem was determined. We measured a correlation factor of

Research problems on numerical ranges in quantum computing

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Time-reversal formalism applied to maximal bipartite entanglement: Theoretical and experimental exploration

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Quantum data bus in dipolar coupled nuclear spin qubits

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