The spontaneous emission rate (SER) is an important figure of merit for any quantum bit (qubit), as it can play a significant role in the control and decoherence of the qubit. As a result, accurately characterizing the SER for practical devices is an important step in the design of quantum information processing devices. Here, we specifically focus on the experimentally popular platform of a transmon qubit, which is a kind of superconducting circuit qubit. Despite the importance of understanding the SER of these qubits, it is often determined using approximate circuit models or is inferred from measurements on a fabricated device. To improve the accuracy of predictions in the design process, it is better to use full-wave numerical methods that can make a minimal number of approximations in the description of practical systems. In this work, we show how this can be done with a recently developed field-based description of transmon qubits coupled to an electromagnetic environment. We validate our model by computing the SER for devices similar to those found in the literature that have been well-characterized experimentally. We further cross-validate our results by comparing them to simplified lumped element circuit and transmission line models as appropriate.
Spontaneous emission through a coupled cavity can be a significant decay channel for qubits in circuit quantum electrodynamics. We present a circuit design that effectively eliminates spontaneous emission due to the Purcell effect while maintaining strong coupling to a low-Q cavity. Excellent agreement over a wide range in frequency is found between measured qubit relaxation times and the predictions of a circuit model. Using fast (nanosecond time-scale) flux biasing of the qubit, we demonstrate in situ control of qubit lifetime over a factor of 50. We realize qubit reset with 99.9% fidelity in 120 ns.
Abstract Superconducting quantum circuits are a leading platform for quantum-information processing, but their development requires expertise spanning device design, microfabrication, cryogenic operation, microwave control, and quantum characterization. In this work, we report the realization of a flux-tunable superconducting transmon platform and present an integrated workflow encompassing design, fabrication, measurement, and numerical modeling. The device consists of an
Al/AlOx/Al transmon coupled to a three-dimensional microwave cavity operating in the circuit quantum electrodynamics (cQED) dispersive regime. Two-tone spectroscopy reveals a fundamental transition frequency of
ω01=5.0122 GHz and an anharmonicity of
α/2π=−202.4 MHz , corresponding to
EJ/EC≈82.9 . Flux spectroscopy yields a cavity-qubit coupling strength of
g/2π=260 MHz , while the cavity linewidth gives a loaded quality factor of
QL=6127 and a Purcell limit of
T1Purcell≈82 μs . Time-domain measurements yield coherence times of
T1=17.4 μs and
T2∗=5.8 μs . To investigate coherence and dissipation in the device, the experimental observations are analyzed within a Lindblad master-equation framework describing cavity photon loss and thermal excitation, qubit energy relaxation, and pure dephasing processes. Using a set of experimentally extracted parameters, the model reproduces the measured spectroscopic and time-domain observables, providing a quantitative description of the open-system dynamics of the transmon-cavity platform. The analysis shows that the measured coherence is primarily limited by pure dephasing and energy-relaxation processes, whereas thermal excitation plays a minor role under the experimental conditions. Inspired by the broader framework of quantum dissipation in macroscopic quantum systems pioneered by Caldeira and collaborators, this approach enables a quantitative analysis of relaxation and dephasing processes in superconducting quantum circuits. Beyond the characterization of a single device, the present work demonstrates the establishment of the expertise, infrastructure, and experimental workflow required for the design, fabrication, measurement, and modeling of superconducting quantum circuits, contributing to the development of quantum technologies in Brazil and related applications.
PhD Thesis: Superconducting circuit quantum electrodynamics (QED) has developed into a powerful platform for studying the interaction between matter and different states of light. In this context, superconducting quantum bits (qubits) act as artificial atoms interacting with quantized modes of the electromagnetic field. The field can be trapped in superconducting microwave resonators or propagating in transmission lines. In this thesis, we particularly study circuit QED systems where microwave fields are coupled with superconducting flux and transmon qubits. We optimize the coherence properties of the resonators, by analyzing loss mechanisms at excitation powers of approximately one photon on average. We find that two-level fluctuators associated with oxide layers at substrate and metal surfaces and metal-metal interfaces represent the predominant loss channel. Furthermore, we show how broadband thermal photon fields influence the relaxation and dephasing properties of a superconducting transmon qubit. To this end, we study several second-order loss channels of the transmon qubit and find that the broadband fields introduce a larger decay rate than expected from the Purcell filter defined by the resonator. Additionally, we show that qubit dephasing at the flux-insensitive point as well as low-frequency parameter fluctuations can be enhanced by thermal fields. Finally, we study how artificial atoms react to changes in inherent properties of the light fields. We perform a detailed analysis of the photon statistics of thermal fields using their relation to the qubits coherence properties. We quantitatively recover the expected
n2+n-law for the photon number variance and confirm this result by direct correlation measurements. We then show a novel technique for the in-situ conversion of the interaction parity in light-matter interaction. To this end, we couple spatially controlled microwave fields to a flux qubit with two degrees of freedom.
We propose a realizable architecture using one-dimensional transmission line resonators to reach the strong-coupling limit of cavity quantum electrodynamics in superconducting electrical circuits. The vacuum Rabi frequency for the coupling of cavity photons to quantized excitations of an adjacent electrical circuit (qubit) can easily exceed the damping rates of both the cavity and qubit. This architecture is attractive both as a macroscopic analog of atomic physics experiments and for quantum computing and control, since it provides strong inhibition of spontaneous emission, potentially leading to greatly enhanced qubit lifetimes, allows high-fidelity quantum nondemolition measurements of the state of multiple qubits, and has a natural mechanism for entanglement of qubits separated by centimeter distances. In addition it would allow production of microwave photon states of fundamental importance for quantum communication.
Significant advances in coherence render superconducting quantum circuits a viable platform for fault-tolerant quantum computing. To further extend capabilities, highly coherent quantum systems could act as quantum memories for these circuits. A useful quantum memory must be rapidly addressable by Josephson-junction-based artificial atoms, while maintaining superior coherence. We demonstrate a superconducting microwave cavity architecture that is highly robust against major sources of loss that are encountered in the engineering of circuit QED systems. The architecture allows for storage of quantum superpositions in a resonator on the millisecond scale, while strong coupling between the resonator and a transmon qubit enables control, encoding, and readout at MHz rates. This extends the maximum available coherence time attainable in superconducting circuits by almost an order of magnitude compared to earlier hardware. Our design is an ideal platform for studying coherent quantum optics and marks an important step towards hardware-efficient quantum computing in Josephson-junction-based quantum circuits.