Measurement-based feedback control is central in quantum computing and precise quantum control. Here we realize a fast and flexible field-programmable-gate-array-based feedback control in an Xmon- superconducting-qubit system. The latency of room-temperature electronics is custom-optimized to be as short as 140 ns. Projective measurement of a signal qubit produces a feedback tag to implement a conditional pulse gate on the qubit. In a feedforward process, the measurement-based feedback tag is brought to a different target qubit for conditional control. In a two-qubit experiment, the feedback and feedforward controls are simultaneously implemented in consecutive steps. A quantum number is then generated by the signal qubit, and a random walk of the target qubit is correspondingly triggered and realized on the Bloch sphere. Our experiment provides a conceptually simple and intuitive benchmark for feedback control in a multiqubit system. The feedback system can be further scaled up for more-complex feedback-control experiments.
Measurement-based feedback control is central in quantum computing and precise quantum control. Here we realize a fast and flexible field-programmable-gate-array-based feedback control in an Xmon- superconducting-qubit system. The latency of room-temperature electronics is custom-optimized to be as short as 140 ns. Projective measurement of a signal qubit produces a feedback tag to implement a conditional pulse gate on the qubit. In a feedforward process, the measurement-based feedback tag is brought to a different target qubit for conditional control. In a two-qubit experiment, the feedback and feedforward controls are simultaneously implemented in consecutive steps. A quantum number is then generated by the signal qubit, and a random walk of the target qubit is correspondingly triggered and realized on the Bloch sphere. Our experiment provides a conceptually simple and intuitive benchmark for feedback control in a multiqubit system. The feedback system can be further scaled up for more-complex feedback-control experiments.
Electronic systems for qubit control and measurement serve as a bridge between quantum programming language and quantum information processors. With the rapid development of superconducting quantum circuit technology, synchronization in a large-scale system, low-latency execution, and low noise are required for electronic systems. Here, we present a field-programmable gate array (FPGA)-based electronic system with a distributed synchronous clock and trigger architecture. The system supports synchronous control of qubits with jitters of ∼5 ps. We implement a real-time digital signal processing system in the FPGA, enabling precise timing control, arbitrary waveform generation, in-phase and quadrature demodulation for qubit state discrimination, and the generation of real-time qubit-state-dependent trigger signals for feedback/feedforward control. The hardware and firmware low-latency design reduces the feedback/feedforward latency of the electronic system to 125 ns, significantly less than the decoherence times of the qubit. Finally, we demonstrate the functionalities and low-noise performance of this system using a fluxonium quantum processor.
Feedback is a main component of many algorithms for quantum computing and communication. A key requirement for any quantum feedback scheme is that the $l\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}a\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}t\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}e\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}n\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}c\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}y$ of the feedback loop (i.e. the time between beginning to measure a state and the end of feedback action on the state) must be significantly shorter than the coherence time of the system. In this work a superconducting qubit is initialized in its ground state by active feedback, using a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) with very short latency. This in-depth discussion of the FPGA-based processing unit provides a useful reference for future development of feedback electronics for quantum systems.
Large-scale qubit systems represent the future of superconducting quantum computing. As the number of qubits and functions increases, the current qubit control architectures struggle to achieve large-scale expansion. To address this issue, we have developed a field-programmable gate array-based scheduling system, which serves as a control architecture deployed on measurement and control hardware. This system achieves the generation of multi-channel long sequence pulses using minimal storage space, with reusable envelope and instruction designs. The envelopes and instructions are preloaded into the electronics, with each instruction corresponding to a different segment of the output waveform. The architecture we designed allows for extended pulse control lengths and more complex experiments without the requirement for external storage resources. We present the resource utilization of the implementation and compare it with previous measurements under different qubit counts. To verify the functionality of the system, we conducted a series of performance tests and characterization experiments on the deployed electronics. The measured single-qubit relaxation time T1 is 34.1 μs, and the dephasing time T2* is 25.8 μs. We characterized the quality of the control pulses using a randomized benchmarking protocol, achieving an average fidelity of 99.962%.
We developed a versatile integrated control and readout instrument for experiments with superconducting quantum bits (qubits), based on a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) platform. Using this platform, we perform measurement-based, closed-loop feedback operations with 428 ns platform latency. The feedback capability is instrumental in realizing active reset initialization of the qubit into the ground state in a time much shorter than its energy relaxation time T1. We show experimental results demonstrating reset of a fluxonium qubit with 99.4 % fidelity, using a readout-and-drive pulse sequence approximately 1. 5 µs long. Compared to passive ground state initialization through thermalization, with the time constant given by T1 = 80 µs, the use of the FPGA-based platform allows us to improve both the fidelity and the time of the qubit initialization by an order of magnitude.
We have developed an electronic hardware system for the control and readout of multi-superconducting qubit devices. The hardware system is based on the design ideas of good scalability, high synchronization and low latency. The system, housed inside a VPX-6U chassis, includes multiple arbitrary-waveform generator (AWG) channels, analog-digital-converter (ADC) channels as well as direct current source channels. The system can be used for the control and readout of up to twelve superconducting transmon qubits in one chassis, and control and readout of more and more qubit can be carried out by interconnecting the chassis. By using field programmable gate array (FPGA) processors, the system incorporates three features that are specifically useful for superconducting qubit research. Firstly, qubit signals can be processed using the on-board FPGA after being acquired by ADCs, significantly reducing data processing time and data amount for storage and transmission. Secondly, different output modes, such as direct output and sequential output modes, of AWG can be implemented with pre-encoded FPGA. Thirdly, with data acquisition ADCs and controlAWGs jointly controlled by the same FPGA, the feedback latency can be reduced, and in ourtest a 178.4 ns latency time is realized. This is very useful for future quantum feedback experiments. Finally, we demonstrate the functionality of the system by applying the system to the control and readout of a 10 qubit superconducting quantum processor.
Superconducting circuits have recently risen to the forefront of the solid-state prototypes for quantum computing. Reaching the stage of robust quantum computing requires closing the loop between measurement and control of quantum bits (qubits). This thesis presents the realization of feedback control of superconducting qubits based on projective measurement, with initial applications. The first application is a reset operation which initializes a qubit in the ground state fast and on demand. In a second experiment, we transform a cavity into a two-qubit parity meter, which is capable of generating entanglement starting from an unentangled superposition state. We then employ feedback to turn the generation of entanglement from probabilistic to deterministic, thus combining two key ingredients - parity measurement and feedback - of quantum error correction. As a third application, we transform a superconducting qubit into a charge-parity detector to investigate the limits of quasiparticle tunneling to qubit coherence. We find room for at least a tenfold increase in qubit coherence times before quasiparticles become the bottleneck. Finally, we present our latest results towards implementing the bit-flip error correction code in a five-qubit processor and discuss the role of feedback control in the future development of superconducting quantum circuits.