Read-Rezayi fractional quantum Hall states are among the prime candidates for realizing non-Abelian anyons which, in principle, can be used for topological quantum computation. We present a prescription for efficiently finding braids which can be used to carry out a universal set of quantum gates on encoded qubits based on anyons of the Read-Rezayi states with k>2, k not equal 4. This work extends previous results which only applied to the case k=3 (Fibonacci) and clarifies why, in that case, gate constructions are simpler than for a generic Read-Rezayi state.
Read-Rezayi fractional quantum Hall states are among the prime candidates for realizing non-Abelian anyons which, in principle, can be used for topological quantum computation. We present a prescription for efficiently finding braids which can be used to carry out a universal set of quantum gates on encoded qubits based on anyons of the Read-Rezayi states with k>2, k not equal 4. This work extends previous results which only applied to the case k=3 (Fibonacci) and clarifies why, in that case, gate constructions are simpler than for a generic Read-Rezayi state.
Non-Abelian anyons promise to reveal spectacular features of quantum mechanics that could ultimately provide the foundation for a decoherence-free quantum computer. A key breakthrough in the pursuit of these exotic particles originated from Read and Green's observation that the Moore-Read quantum Hall state and a (relatively simple) two-dimensional p+ip superconductor both support so-called Ising non-Abelian anyons. Here we establish a similar correspondence between the Z_3 Read-Rezayi quantum Hall state and a novel two-dimensional superconductor in which charge-2e Cooper pairs are built from fractionalized quasiparticles. In particular, both phases harbor Fibonacci anyons that---unlike Ising anyons---allow for universal topological quantum computation solely through braiding. Using a variant of Teo and Kane's construction of non-Abelian phases from weakly coupled chains, we provide a blueprint for such a superconductor using Abelian quantum Hall states interlaced with an array of superconducting islands. Fibonacci anyons appear as neutral deconfined particles that lead to a two-fold ground-state degeneracy on a torus. In contrast to a p+ip superconductor, vortices do not yield additional particle types yet depending on non-universal energetics can serve as a trap for Fibonacci anyons. These results imply that one can, in principle, combine well-understood and widely available phases of matter to realize non-Abelian anyons with universal braid statistics. Numerous future directions are discussed, including speculations on alternative realizations with fewer experimental requirements.
Topological quantum computation encodes quantum information in the internal fusion space of non-Abelian anyonic quasiparticles, whose braiding implements logical gates. This goes beyond Abelian topological order (TO) such as the toric code, as its anyons lack internal structure. However, the simplest non-Abelian generalizations of the toric code do not support universality via braiding alone. Here we demonstrate that such minimally non-Abelian TOs can be made universal by treating anyon fusion as a computational primitive. We prepare a 54-qubit TO wavefunction associated with the smallest non-Abelian group, S3, on Quantinuum's H2 quantum processor. This phase of matter exhibits cyclic anyon fusion rules, known to underpin universality, which we evidence by trapping a single non-Abelian anyon on the torus. We encode logical qutrits in the nonlocal fusion space of non-Abelian fluxes and, by combining an entangling braiding operation with anyon charge measurements, realize a universal topological gate set and read-out, which we further demonstrate by topologically preparing a magic state. This work establishes S3 TO as simple enough to be prepared efficiently, yet rich enough to enable universal topological quantum computation.
We investigate a promising conformal field theory realization scheme for topological quantum computation based on the Fibonacci anyons, which are believed to be realized as quasiparticle excitations in the Z3 parafermion fractional quantum Hall state in the second Landau level with filling factor ν=12/5. These anyons are non-Abelian and are known to be capable of universal topological quantum computation. The quantum information is encoded in the fusion channels of pairs of such non-Abelian anyons and is protected from noise and decoherence by the topological properties of these systems.The quantum gates are realized by braiding of these anyons. We propose here an implementation of the n-qubit topological quantum register in terms of 2n+2 Fibonacci anyons. The matrices emerging from the anyon exchanges, i.e. the generators of the braid group for one qubit are derived from the coordinate wave functions of a large number of electron holes and 4 Fibonacci anyons which can furthermore be represented as correlation functions in Z3 parafermionic two-dimensional conformal field theory. The representations of the braid groups for more than 4 anyons are obtained by fusing pairs of anyons before braiding, thus reducing eventually the system to 4 anyons.
A quantum computer must be capable of manipulating quantum information while at the same time protecting it from error and loss of quantum coherence due to interactions with the environment. Topological quantum computation (TQC) offers a particularly elegant way to achieve this. In TQC, quantum information is stored in exotic states of matter which are intrinsically protected from decoherence, and quantum computation is carried out by dragging particle-like excitations (quasiparticles) around one another in two space dimensions. The resulting quasiparticle trajectories define world-lines in three-dimensional space-time, and the corresponding computation depends only on the topology of the braids formed by the world-lines. Quasiparticles that can be used for TQC are expected to exist in a variety of fractional quantum Hall states, among them the so-called Fibonacci anyons. These quasiparticles are conjectured to exist in the = 12/5 fractional quantum Hall state which has been observed in experiments. It has been shown that qubits can be encoded using three or four Fibonacci anyons and single-qubit gates can be carried out by braiding quasiparticles within each qubit. Braids that approximate single-qubit gates can be found through brute force searching and the result can be systematically improved, to any desired accuracy, by applying the Solovay- Kitaev algorithm in SU(2). Two-qubit gates are significantly harder to implement, mostly due to the following two reasons. First, the Hilbert space of the quasiparticles forming two qubits is considerably larger than the Hilbert space of the quasiparticles of a single qubit. Therefore, performing a brute force search to find braids that approximate two-qubit gates, as well as the implementation of the Solovay-Kitaev algorithm for subsequent improvements are prohibitively more difficult. Second, to construct any entangling two-qubit gate, one needs to braid some xvii of the quasiparticles from one qubit around quasiparticles of the other qubit. This process will inevitably lead to leakage errors, i.e. transitions from the qubit space to other available states in the Hilbert space. In this thesis, I will present several efficient methods to construct two-qubit gates using a specific class of quasiparticles. In particular, I show that the problem of finding braids that correspond to two-qubit gates can be reduced to a series of smaller problems which involve braiding only three objects at a time. The required computational power for finding these braids is equivalent to that needed to find single-qubit gates, therefore, these braids can be found with the same high degree of accuracy and efficiency. The end result of this work is an efficient procedure for translating (or "compiling") arbitrary quantum algorithms into specific braiding patterns for Fibonacci anyons, as well as quasiparticles of certain other fractional quantum Hall states that can be used for TQC.
Abstract Quantum many-body systems with a non-Abelian topological order can host anyonic quasiparticles. It has been proposed that anyons could be used to encode and manipulate information in a topologically protected manner that is immune to local noise, with quantum gates performed by braiding and fusing anyons. Unfortunately, realizing non-Abelian topologically ordered states is challenging, and it was not until recently that the signatures of non-Abelian statistics were observed through digital quantum simulation approaches. However, not all forms of topological order can be used to realize universal quantum computation. Here we use a superconducting quantum processor to simulate non-Abelian topologically ordered states of the Fibonacci string-net model and demonstrate braidings of Fibonacci anyons featuring universal computational power. We demonstrate the non-trivial topological nature of the quantum states by measuring the topological entanglement entropy. In addition, we create two pairs of Fibonacci anyons and demonstrate their fusion rule and non-Abelian braiding statistics by applying unitary gates on the underlying physical qubits. Our results establish a digital approach to explore non-Abelian topological states and their associated braiding statistics with current noisy intermediate-scale quantum processors.
If one could be built, a quantum computer would be capable of storing and manipulating quantum states with sufficient accuracy to carry out computations that no classical computer can do (most notably factoring integers in polynomial time). The greatest obstacle to building such a device is the problem of error and decoherence. Classical computers can exploit the physical robustness of ordered states to protect classical information (as in, for example, the magnetically ordered state of a hard drive). Remarkably, a type of quantum order known as topological order can, in principle, play the same role for quantum information. The best studied topologically ordered states are quantum Hall states. These states arise when a two-dimensional electron gas is placed in a strong magnetic field and cooled to low temperatures. Under the right conditions, the electrons condense into an incompressible quantum liquid whose excitations are particle-like objects with fractional charge (quasiparticles). Certain quantum Hall states are thought to be non Abelian. This means that when a finite number of quasiparticles are present and fixed in space there is a low energy Hilbert space with finite dimension, rather than a unique state. Unitary operations can then be carried out on this Hilbert space by adiabatically dragging quasiparticles around one another so that their world-lines sweep out braids in 2+1 dimensional space time. A quantum computer which stores quantum information in this Hilbert space and computes by braiding is known as a topological quantum computer. In this thesis I review our work on determining precisely how one would carry out a computation on a topological quantum computer. I focus on the so-called Fibonacci anyons--quasiparticles which may exist in the experimentally observed quantum Hall state at Landau level filling fraction ν = 12/5. I give explicit prescriptions for encoding qubits (quantum bits) using Fibonacci anyons, and show how one would carry out a universal set of quantum gates (the quantum analogs of Boolean logic gates) by braiding them. I then focus in particular on my work developing algorithms for performing brute force searches over the space of braids to find braids which produce unitary operations close to any desired operation. These brute force searches are a crucial part of our quantum gate construction, and I show that by using a so-called "load balanced" bidirectional search I can find braids which approximate any desired operation to an accuracy of 1 part in 10 5 . I then turn to my work calculating the Berry's phase obtained when quasiparticles are moved around one another in the Moore-Read state, a non Abelian state generally believed to describe the ν = 5/2 quantum Hall effect. This work is done using variational Monte Carlo, a method which allows one to numerically evaluate the Berry's phase for finite size systems. By exploiting certain properties of the Moore-Read state I have been able to study systems consisting of as many as 150 electrons. In so doing I have verified the conjectured connection between the Berry's phase produced by physically moving quasiparticles around one another and the mathematical phase one obtains by simply analytically continuing the quasiparticle coordinates. An added benefit of these calculations is that we can deduce the length scale which determines the size of the quasiparticles. This length scale dictates how far apart the quasiparticles must be in order to prevent errors when they are used for topological quantum computation.