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arXiv:2109.04965 · Journal of Physics Communications

Deterministic loading of a single strontium ion into a surface electrode trap using pulsed laser ablation

Alto Osada, Atsushi Noguchi

Published Jan 1, 2022• 7 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Abstract Trapped-ion quantum technologies have been developed for decades toward applications such as precision measurement, quantum communication and quantum computation. Coherent manipulation of ions’ oscillatory motions in an ion trap is important for quantum information processing by ions, however, unwanted decoherence caused by fluctuating electric-field environment often hinders stable and high-fidelity operations. One way to avoid this is to adopt pulsed laser ablation for ion loading, a loading method with significantly reduced pollution and heat production. Despite the usefulness of the ablation loading such as the compatibility with cryogenic environment, randomness of the number of loaded ions is still problematic in realistic applications where definite number of ions are preferably loaded with high probability. In this paper, we demonstrate an efficient loading of a single strontium ion into a surface electrode trap generated by laser ablation and successive photoionization. The probability of single-ion loading into a surface electrode trap is measured to be 82%, and such a deterministic single-ion loading allows for loading ions into the trap one-by-one. Our results open up a way to develop more functional ion-trap quantum devices by the clean, stable, and deterministic ion loading.

DOI
10.1088/2399-6528/ac4b4a

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Abstract Trapped-ion quantum technologies have been developed for decades toward applications such as precision measurement, quantum communication and quantum computation. Coherent manipulation of ions’ oscillatory motions in an ion trap is important for quantum information processing by ions, however, unwanted decoherence caused by fluctuating electric-field environment often hinders stable and high-fidelity operations. One way to avoid this is to adopt pulsed laser ablation for ion loading, a loading method with significantly reduced pollution and heat production. Despite the usefulness of the ablation loading such as the compatibility with cryogenic environment, randomness of the number of loaded ions is still problematic in realistic applications where definite number of ions are preferably loaded with high probability. In this paper, we demonstrate an efficient loading of a single strontium ion into a surface electrode trap generated by laser ablation and successive photoionization. The probability of single-ion loading into a surface electrode trap is measured to be 82%, and such a deterministic single-ion loading allows for loading ions into the trap one-by-one. Our results open up a way to develop more functional ion-trap quantum devices by the clean, stable, and deterministic ion loading.
Trapped-ion quantum information processing may benefit from qubits encoded in isotopes that are practically available in only small quantities, e.g., due to low natural abundance or radioactivity. Laser ablation provides a method of controllably liberating neutral atoms or ions from low-volume targets, but energetic ablation products can be difficult to confine in the small ion-electrode distance, micron-scale microfabricated traps amenable to high-speed, high-fidelity manipulation of ion arrays. Here, we investigate ablation-based ion loading into surface-electrode traps of different sizes to test a model describing ion loading probability as a function of effective trap volume and other trap parameters. We characterize loading of ablated barium from a metallic source in two cryogenic surface-electrode traps with 730 and 50 μm ion-electrode distances. Our loading rate agrees with a predictive analytical model, providing insight for the confinement of limited-quantity species of interest for quantum computing, simulation, and sensing.
We demonstrate loading of 88Sr+^{88}\mathrm{Sr}^{+}88Sr+ ions by laser ablation into a mm-scale surface-electrode ion trap. The laser used for ablation is a pulsed, frequency-tripled Nd:YAG with pulse energies of 1−−10mJ1--10\phantom{\rule{0.3em}{0ex}}\mathrm{mJ}1−−10mJ and durations of 4ns4\phantom{\rule{0.3em}{0ex}}\mathrm{ns}4ns. An additional laser is not required to photoionize the ablated material. The efficiency and lifetime of several candidate materials for the laser ablation target are characterized by measuring the trapped ion fluorescence signal for a number of consecutive loads. Additionally, laser ablation is used to load traps with a trap depth (40meV)(40\phantom{\rule{0.3em}{0ex}}\mathrm{meV})(40meV) below where electron impact ionization loading is typically successful $(\ensuremath{\gtrsim}500\phantom{\rule{0.3em}{0ex}}\mathrm{meV})$.
We demonstrate loading of ions into a surface-electrode trap (SET) from a remote, laser-cooled source of neutral atoms. We first cool and load $\ensuremath{\sim}$106{10}^{6}106 neutral 88{}^{88}88Sr atoms into a magneto-optical trap from an oven that has no line of sight with the SET. The cold atoms are then pushed with a resonant laser into the trap region where they are subsequently photoionized and trapped in an SET operated at a cryogenic temperature of 4.6 K. We present studies of the loading process and show that our technique achieves ion loading into a shallow (15 meV depth) trap at rates as high as 125 ions/s while drastically reducing the amount of metal deposition on the trap surface as compared with direct loading from a hot vapor. Furthermore, we note that due to multiple stages of isotopic filtering in our loading process, this technique has the potential for enhanced isotopic selectivity over other loading methods. Rapid loading from a clean, isotopically pure, and precooled source may enable scalable quantum-information processing with trapped ions in large, low-depth surface-trap arrays that are not amenable to loading from a hot atomic beam.
The major challenges in trapped-ion quantum computation are to scale up few-ion experiments to many qubits and to improve control techniques so that quantum logic gates can be carried out with higher fidelities. This thesis reports experimental progress in both of these areas. In the early part of the thesis we describe the fabrication of a surface-electrode ion trap, the development of the apparatus and techniques required to operate it and the successful trapping of 40Ca+ ions. Notably we developed methods to control the orientation of the principal axes and to minimise ion micromotion. We propose a repumping scheme that simplifies heating rate measurements for ions with low-lying D levels, and use it to characterise the electric field noise in the trap. Surface-electrode traps are important because they offer a route to dense integration of electronic and optical control elements using existing microfabrication technology. We explore this scaling route by testing a series of three traps that were microfabricated at Sandia National Laboratories. Investigations of micromotion and charging of the surface by laser beams were carried out and improvements to future traps are suggested. Using one of these traps we also investigated anomalous electrical noise from the electrode surfaces and discovered that it can be reduced by cleaning with a pulsed laser. A factor of two decrease was observed; this represents the first in situ removal of this noise source, an important step towards higher gate fidelities. In the second half of the thesis we describe the design and construction of an experiment for the purpose of replacing laser-driven multi-qubit quantum logic gates with microwave-driven ones. We investigate magnetic-field-independent hyperfine qubits in 40Ca+ as suitable qubits for this scheme. We make a design study of how best to integrate an ion trap with the microwave conductors required to implement the gate and propose a novel integrated resonant structure. The trap was fabricated and ions were successfully loaded. Single-qubit experiments show that the microwave fields above the trap are in excellent agreement with software simulations. There are good prospects for demonstrating a multi-qubit gate in the near future. We conclude by discussing the possibilities for larger-scale quantum computation by combining microfabricated traps and microwave control.
In this paper, we present a detailed method for rapidly and effectively loading a single 40 Ca + ion into a miniature linear Paul trap. Calcium atoms are generated by laser ablation, and the single ion is loaded and specific isotopes are selected by a two-step photo-ionization method. Compared to the traditional photo-ionization method in which atoms are typically emitted from a resistively heated oven, the advantages of laser ablation are that it can be precisely controlled, it can effectively avoid the problem of fluxed calcium deposition on the trap electrodes, and it restricts the generation of dark ions, which can influence atomic-precision spectroscopy measurements. With its short loading time, it is possible to load an ion in few seconds with the appropriate parameters. The technique of laser ablation has been applied to generate several species of atoms and ions at present, it will potentially benefit in the studies of optical frequency standards, quantum simulation and quantum information processing in an ultra-high vacuum condition and cryogenic system.