High-fidelity qubit measurements play a crucial role in quantum computation, communication, and metrology. In recent experiments, it has been shown that readout fidelity can be improved by performing repeated quantum nondemolition (QND) readouts of a qubit's state through an ancilla. For a qubit encoded in a two-level system, the fidelity of such schemes is limited by the fact that a single error can destroy the information in the qubit. On the other hand, if a bosonic system is used, this fundamental limit can be overcome by utilizing higher levels such that a single error still leaves states distinguishable. In this work, we present a robust readout scheme which leverages both repeated QND readouts and higher-level encodings to asymptotically suppress the effects of mode relaxation and individual measurement infidelity. We calculate the measurement fidelity in terms of general experimental parameters, provide an information-theoretic description of the scheme, and describe its application to several encodings, including cat and binomial codes.
High-fidelity qubit measurements play a crucial role in quantum computation, communication, and metrology. In recent experiments, it has been shown that readout fidelity can be improved by performing repeated quantum nondemolition (QND) readouts of a qubit's state through an ancilla. For a qubit encoded in a two-level system, the fidelity of such schemes is limited by the fact that a single error can destroy the information in the qubit. On the other hand, if a bosonic system is used, this fundamental limit can be overcome by utilizing higher levels such that a single error still leaves states distinguishable. In this work, we present a robust readout scheme which leverages both repeated QND readouts and higher-level encodings to asymptotically suppress the effects of mode relaxation and individual measurement infidelity. We calculate the measurement fidelity in terms of general experimental parameters, provide an information-theoretic description of the scheme, and describe its application to several encodings, including cat and binomial codes.
Qubit measurements are central to quantum information processing.In the field of superconducting qubits, standard readout techniques are limited not only by the signal-to-noise ratio, but also by state relaxation during the measurement.In this work, we demonstrate that the limitation due to relaxation can be suppressed by using the many-level Hilbert space of superconducting circuits: In a multilevel encoding, the measurement is corrupted only when multiple errors occur.Employing this technique, we show that we can directly resolve transmon gate errors at the level of one part in 10 3 .Extending this idea, we apply the same principles to the measurement of a logical qubit encoded in a bosonic mode and detected with a transmon ancilla, implementing a proposal by Hann et al. [Phys. Rev. A 98, 022305 (2018)].Qubit state assignments are made based on a sequence of repeated readouts, further reducing the overall infidelity.This approach is quite general, and several encodings are studied; the codewords are more distinguishable when the distance between them is increased with respect to photon loss.The trade-off between multiple readouts and state relaxation is explored and shown to be consistent with the photon-loss model.We report a logical assignment infidelity of 5.8 × 10 -5 for a Fock-based encoding and 4.2 × 10 -3 for a quantum error correction code (the S ¼ 2, N ¼ 1 binomial code).Our results not only improve the fidelity of quantum information applications, but also enable more precise characterization of process or gate errors.
Realizing fault-tolerant quantum computing relies on efficient quantum error correction. Bosonic cat-state qubits offer a highly promising, hardware-efficient approach by intrinsically suppressing bit-flip errors. However, fully unlocking their potential demands fast and high-fidelity quantum nondemolition (QND) measurements. Here, we propose a high-fidelity QND readout protocol for cat-state qubits in a Kerr-nonlinear resonator utilizing an effective longitudinal interaction. By deriving analytical expressions and performing numerical simulations, we demonstrate that longitudinal readout achieves faster signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) growth and shorter measurement times than conventional dispersive readout. Furthermore, we show that injecting squeezed input states can exponentially enhance the SNR, while time-dependent coupling further reduces the measurement time. This scheme provides a robust pathway toward rapid and nondestructive measurement of cat qubits in near-term quantum processors. Reliable quantum computers require error-resistant components like cat-state qubits, along with fast, non-destructive ways to readout them. Here, the authors propose a longitudinal readout protocol for these qubits that achieves faster and higher-fidelity measurements than conventional methods.
We study the quantitative characterization of the performance of qubit measurements in this paper. In particular, the back-action evading nature of quantum nondemolition (QND) readout of qubits is fully quantified by quantum trace distance. Only computational basis states are necessary to be taken into consideration. Most importantly, we propose an experimentally efficient method to evaluate the QND fidelity based on the classical trace distance, which uses an experimental scheme with two consecutive measurements. The three key quantifiers of a measurement, i.e., QND fidelity, readout fidelity, and projectivity, can be derived directly from the same experimental scheme. Besides, we present the relationships among these three factors. Theoretical simulation results for the dispersive readout of superconducting qubits show the validity of the proposed QND fidelity. Efficient quantification of measurement performance is of practical significance for the diagnosis, performance improvement, and design of measurement apparatuses.
Quantum Information
Successful protocols for quantum information processing and quantum computation depend on the reliable storage and manipulation of the quantum state of a qubit. Qubits, however, are prone to errors because complete isolation from the environment is not possible. Methods for correcting these errors must also contend with the fact that direct measurement of a qubit destroys it. Xue et al. describe a repetitive quantum nondemolition method on a two-qubit system in which the state of the main qubit is mapped onto a second qubit that acts as an ancilla. Repeated measurement of the ancilla qubit allows the main qubit to be maintained and read out with higher fidelity. Such a protocol provides a route to robust quantum information processing in solid-state systems.
Phys. Rev. X 10 , 021006 (2020).
High-fidelity initialization, manipulation, and measurement of qubits are important in quantum computing. For the Google’s Sycamore processor, the gate fidelity of single- and two-qubit logic operations has improved to>99.6%, whereas single-shot measurement fidelity remains at the level of 97%, which severely limits the application of the superconducting approach to large-scale quantum computing. The current measurement scheme relies on the dispersive interaction between the qubit and the readout resonator, which was proposed back in 2004. However, the measurement fidelity is limited by the trade-off between the state separation and relaxation time of the two-level system. Recently, an exciting phenomenon was observed experimentally, wherein the separation-decay limit could be alleviated by exploiting the cascade decay nature of the higher levels; however, the mechanism and effectiveness of this phenomenon are still unclear. Herein, we present a theoretical tool to extract different types of errors in high-level states encoding dispersive measurement. For the realistic parameters of Google’s Sycamore processor, the use of state |2〉 is sufficient to suppress 92% of the decay readout error on average, where the total readout error is dominated by the background thermal excitation. We also show counter-intuitively that, the assistance of high-level states is effective in the measurement of logic 0, where there is no decay process.
Quantum error correction is of crucial importance for fault-tolerant quantum computers.As an essential step toward the implementation of quantum error-correcting codes, quantum nondemolition measurements are needed to efficiently detect the state of a logical qubit without destroying it.Here we implement quantum nondemolition measurements in a Si/SiGe two-qubit system, with one qubit serving as the logical qubit and the other serving as the ancilla.Making use of a two-qubit controlled-rotation gate, the state of the logical qubit is mapped onto the ancilla, followed by a destructive readout of the ancilla.Repeating this procedure enhances the logical readout fidelity from 75.5 Æ 0.3% to 94.5 Æ 0.2% after 15 ancilla readouts.In addition, we compare the conventional thresholding method with an improved signal processing method called soft decoding that makes use of analog information in the readout signal to better estimate the state of the logical qubit.We demonstrate that soft decoding leads to a significant reduction in the required number of repetitions when the readout errors become limited by Gaussian noise, for instance, in the case of readouts with a low signal-to-noise ratio.These results pave the way for the implementation of quantum error correction with spin qubits in silicon.