Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

arXiv:1704.08734 · Physical Review A

Towards a heralded eigenstate-preserving measurement of multi-qubit parity in circuit QED

Patrick Huembeli, Simon E. Nigg

Published Jul 11, 2017• 6 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Eigenstate-preserving multi-qubit parity measurements lie at the heart of stabilizer quantum error correction, which is a promising approach to mitigate the problem of decoherence in quantum computers. In this work we explore a high-fidelity, eigenstate-preserving parity readout for superconducting qubits dispersively coupled to a microwave resonator, where the parity bit is encoded in the amplitude of a coherent state of the resonator. Detecting photons emitted by the resonator via a current biased Josephson junction yields information about the parity bit. We analyze theoretically the measurement back action in the limit of a strongly coupled fast detector and show that in general such a parity measurement, while approximately quantum nondemolition is not eigenstate preserving. To remediate this shortcoming we propose a simple dynamical decoupling technique during photon detection, which greatly reduces decoherence within a given parity subspace. Furthermore, by applying a sequence of fast displacement operations interleaved with the dynamical decoupling pulses, the natural bias of this binary detector can be efficiently suppressed. Finally, we introduce the concept of a heralded parity measurement, where a detector click guarantees successful multi-qubit parity detection even for finite detection efficiency.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.96.012313

Related papers

Qubit parity measurement by parametric driving in circuit QED

Baptiste Royer, Shruti Puri, Alexandre Blais

Multiqubit parity measurements are essential to quantum error correction. Current realizations of these measurements often rely on ancilla qubits, a method that is sensitive to faulty two-qubit gates and that requires notable experimental overhead. We propose a hardware-efficient multiqubit parity measurement exploiting the bifurcation dynamics of a parametrically driven nonlinear oscillator. This approach takes advantage of the resonator's parametric oscillation threshold, which depends on the joint parity of dispersively coupled qubits, leading to high-amplitude oscillations for one parity subspace and no oscillation for the other. We present analytical and numerical results for two- and four-qubit parity measurements, with high-fidelity readout preserving the parity eigenpaces. Moreover, we discuss a possible realization that can be readily implemented with the current circuit quantum electrodynamics (QED) experimental toolbox. These results could lead to substantial simplifications in the experimental implementation of quantum error correction and notably of the surface code.

arXiv:1802.10112•Science Advances•Nov 2, 2018•30 citations

Nonlinear parity readout with a microwave photodetector

Marius Schöndorf, Frank K. Wilhelm

Robust high-fidelity parity measurement is an important operation in many applications of quantum computing. In this work we show how in a circuit QED architecture, one can measure parity in a single shot at very high contrast by taking advantage of the nonlinear behavior of a strongly driven microwave cavity coupled to one or multiple qubits. We work in a nonlinear dispersive regime treated in an exact dispersive transformation. We show that appropriate tuning of experimental parameters leads to very high contrast in the cavity and therefore to a high-efficiency parity readout with a microwave photon counter or another amplitude detector. These tuning conditions are based on nonlinearity and are hence more robust than previously described linear tuning schemes. In the first part of the paper we show in detail how to achieve this for two-qubit parity measurements and extend this to $N$ qubits in the second part of the paper. We also study the quantum nondemolition character of the protocol.

arXiv:1801.00713•Physical Review A•Apr 20, 2018•3 citations

High-fidelity qubit measurement with a microwave-photon counter

Luke C. G. Govia, Emily Pritchett, Canran Xu +4 more

High-fidelity, efficient quantum nondemolition readout of quantum bits is integral to the goal of quantum computation. As superconducting circuits approach the requirements of scalable, universal fault tolerance, qubit readout must also meet the demand of simplicity to scale with growing system size. Here we propose a fast, high-fidelity, scalable measurement scheme based on the state-selective ring-up of a cavity followed by photodetection with the recently introduced Josephson photomultiplier (JPM), a current-biased Josephson junction. This scheme maps qubit state information to the binary digital output of the JPM, circumventing the need for room-temperature heterodyne detection and offering the possibility of a cryogenic interface to superconducting digital control circuitry. Numerics show that measurement contrast in excess of 95% is achievable in a measurement time of 140 ns. We discuss perspectives to scale this scheme to enable readout of multiple qubit channels with a single JPM.

arXiv:1502.01564•Physical Review A•Dec 2, 2014•41 citations

Stabilizer quantum error correction toolbox for superconducting qubits

Simon E. Nigg, S. M. Girvin

We present a general protocol for stabilizer measurements and pumping in a system of N superconducting qubits. We assume always-on, equal dispersive couplings to a single mode of a high-Q microwave resonator in the ultra-strong dispersive limit where the dispersive shifts largely exceed the spectral linewidth. In this limit, we show how to map the two eigenvalues of an arbitrary weight M < N Pauli operator, onto two quasi-orthogonal coherent states of the cavity. Together with a fast cavity readout, this enables the efficient measurement of stabilizer operators.

arXiv:1212.4000•Bulletin of the American Physical Society•Dec 17, 2012•0 citations

Fast high-fidelity quantum nondemolition readout of a superconducting qubit with tunable transverse couplings

Bryan Gard, Zachary Parrott, Kurt A. Jacobs +2 more

Dispersive readout, the current standard for measuring superconducting qubits, relies on relatively easy to engineer, static transverse coupling between a qubit and a detuned cavity mode. However, this method requires circuit design trade-offs between qubit-cavity coupling, cavity-feedline coupling, detuning, and the resultant decoherence introduced by the cavity mode. Additionally, the criteria for performing quantum nondemolition measurements, including reduced cavity photon numbers, further limits speed and fidelity. In this work, we introduce a circuit with pulse-tunable qubit-cavity and cavity-feedline couplings so that the entire qubit-measurement process can be fully optimized. Here, the core measurement process resembles a quantum gate operation between the qubit and the cavity, with the cavity acting like an ancilla, storing the qubit-state information. To fully explore time-dependent effects of the full qubit-cavity dynamics, we go beyond the rotating-wave, Jaynes-Cummings, or dispersive approximations, to develop a pulsed-measurement protocol. In addition, we propose a realistic circuit architecture that can provide a very fast, high-fidelity, QND measurement with near-unit efficiency.

Physical Review Applied•Feb 5, 2024•8 citations

Degeneracy-Preserving Quantum Nondemolition Measurement of Parity-Type Observables for Cat Qubits

Joachim Cohen, W. Clarke Smith, Michel Devoret +1 more

A central requirement for any quantum error correction scheme is the ability to perform quantum nondemolition measurements of an error syndrome, corresponding to a special symmetry property of the encoding scheme. It is in particular important that such a measurement does not introduce extra error mechanisms, not included in the error model of the correction scheme. In this Letter, we ensure such a robustness by designing an interaction with a measurement device that preserves the degeneracy of the measured observable. More precisely, we propose a scheme to perform continuous and quantum nondemolition measurement of photon-number parity in a microwave cavity. This corresponds to the error syndrome in a class of error correcting codes called the cat codes, which have recently proven to be efficient and versatile for quantum information processing. In our design, we exploit the strongly nonlinear Hamiltonian of a high-impedance Josephson circuit, coupling a high-Q cavity storage cavity mode to a low-Q readout one. By driving the readout resonator at its resonance, the phase of the reflected or transmitted signal carries directly exploitable information on parity-type observables for encoded cat qubits of the high-Q mode.

arXiv:1611.01219•Physical Review Letters•Aug 9, 2017•45 citations
Eigenstate-preserving multi-qubit parity measurements lie at the heart of stabilizer quantum error correction, which is a promising approach to mitigate the problem of decoherence in quantum computers. In this work we explore a high-fidelity, eigenstate-preserving parity readout for superconducting qubits dispersively coupled to a microwave resonator, where the parity bit is encoded in the amplitude of a coherent state of the resonator. Detecting photons emitted by the resonator via a current biased Josephson junction yields information about the parity bit. We analyze theoretically the measurement back action in the limit of a strongly coupled fast detector and show that in general such a parity measurement, while approximately quantum nondemolition is not eigenstate preserving. To remediate this shortcoming we propose a simple dynamical decoupling technique during photon detection, which greatly reduces decoherence within a given parity subspace. Furthermore, by applying a sequence of fast displacement operations interleaved with the dynamical decoupling pulses, the natural bias of this binary detector can be efficiently suppressed. Finally, we introduce the concept of a heralded parity measurement, where a detector click guarantees successful multi-qubit parity detection even for finite detection efficiency.
Multiqubit parity measurements are essential to quantum error correction. Current realizations of these measurements often rely on ancilla qubits, a method that is sensitive to faulty two-qubit gates and that requires notable experimental overhead. We propose a hardware-efficient multiqubit parity measurement exploiting the bifurcation dynamics of a parametrically driven nonlinear oscillator. This approach takes advantage of the resonator's parametric oscillation threshold, which depends on the joint parity of dispersively coupled qubits, leading to high-amplitude oscillations for one parity subspace and no oscillation for the other. We present analytical and numerical results for two- and four-qubit parity measurements, with high-fidelity readout preserving the parity eigenpaces. Moreover, we discuss a possible realization that can be readily implemented with the current circuit quantum electrodynamics (QED) experimental toolbox. These results could lead to substantial simplifications in the experimental implementation of quantum error correction and notably of the surface code.
Robust high-fidelity parity measurement is an important operation in many applications of quantum computing. In this work we show how in a circuit QED architecture, one can measure parity in a single shot at very high contrast by taking advantage of the nonlinear behavior of a strongly driven microwave cavity coupled to one or multiple qubits. We work in a nonlinear dispersive regime treated in an exact dispersive transformation. We show that appropriate tuning of experimental parameters leads to very high contrast in the cavity and therefore to a high-efficiency parity readout with a microwave photon counter or another amplitude detector. These tuning conditions are based on nonlinearity and are hence more robust than previously described linear tuning schemes. In the first part of the paper we show in detail how to achieve this for two-qubit parity measurements and extend this to NNN qubits in the second part of the paper. We also study the quantum nondemolition character of the protocol.
High-fidelity, efficient quantum nondemolition readout of quantum bits is integral to the goal of quantum computation. As superconducting circuits approach the requirements of scalable, universal fault tolerance, qubit readout must also meet the demand of simplicity to scale with growing system size. Here we propose a fast, high-fidelity, scalable measurement scheme based on the state-selective ring-up of a cavity followed by photodetection with the recently introduced Josephson photomultiplier (JPM), a current-biased Josephson junction. This scheme maps qubit state information to the binary digital output of the JPM, circumventing the need for room-temperature heterodyne detection and offering the possibility of a cryogenic interface to superconducting digital control circuitry. Numerics show that measurement contrast in excess of 95% is achievable in a measurement time of 140 ns. We discuss perspectives to scale this scheme to enable readout of multiple qubit channels with a single JPM.
We present a general protocol for stabilizer measurements and pumping in a system of N superconducting qubits. We assume always-on, equal dispersive couplings to a single mode of a high-Q microwave resonator in the ultra-strong dispersive limit where the dispersive shifts largely exceed the spectral linewidth. In this limit, we show how to map the two eigenvalues of an arbitrary weight M < N Pauli operator, onto two quasi-orthogonal coherent states of the cavity. Together with a fast cavity readout, this enables the efficient measurement of stabilizer operators.
Dispersive readout, the current standard for measuring superconducting qubits, relies on relatively easy to engineer, static transverse coupling between a qubit and a detuned cavity mode. However, this method requires circuit design trade-offs between qubit-cavity coupling, cavity-feedline coupling, detuning, and the resultant decoherence introduced by the cavity mode. Additionally, the criteria for performing quantum nondemolition measurements, including reduced cavity photon numbers, further limits speed and fidelity. In this work, we introduce a circuit with pulse-tunable qubit-cavity and cavity-feedline couplings so that the entire qubit-measurement process can be fully optimized. Here, the core measurement process resembles a quantum gate operation between the qubit and the cavity, with the cavity acting like an ancilla, storing the qubit-state information. To fully explore time-dependent effects of the full qubit-cavity dynamics, we go beyond the rotating-wave, Jaynes-Cummings, or dispersive approximations, to develop a pulsed-measurement protocol. In addition, we propose a realistic circuit architecture that can provide a very fast, high-fidelity, QND measurement with near-unit efficiency.
A central requirement for any quantum error correction scheme is the ability to perform quantum nondemolition measurements of an error syndrome, corresponding to a special symmetry property of the encoding scheme. It is in particular important that such a measurement does not introduce extra error mechanisms, not included in the error model of the correction scheme. In this Letter, we ensure such a robustness by designing an interaction with a measurement device that preserves the degeneracy of the measured observable. More precisely, we propose a scheme to perform continuous and quantum nondemolition measurement of photon-number parity in a microwave cavity. This corresponds to the error syndrome in a class of error correcting codes called the cat codes, which have recently proven to be efficient and versatile for quantum information processing. In our design, we exploit the strongly nonlinear Hamiltonian of a high-impedance Josephson circuit, coupling a high-Q cavity storage cavity mode to a low-Q readout one. By driving the readout resonator at its resonance, the phase of the reflected or transmitted signal carries directly exploitable information on parity-type observables for encoded cat qubits of the high-Q mode.