Abstract The coherence time of an optically trapped neutral atom is a crucial parameter for quantum technologies. We found that optical dipole traps with higher-order spatial forms inherently offer lower decoherence rates compared to those with lower-order spatial forms. We formulated the decoherence rate caused by the variance of the differential energy shift and photon jumping rate. Then, we constructed blue-detuned harmonic and quartic optical dipole traps, and experimentally investigated the coherence time of a trapped single cesium atom. Specifically, we demonstrated a significant improvement in the coherence time of a single atom by employing a quartic trap with the same characteristic trap potential and size as its harmonic counterpart—achieving an enhancement from 315 ms to 474 ms. The experimental results qualitatively verified our theory. Our approach provides a novel method to enhance the coherence time of optically trapped neutral atoms.
The performance of many control tasks with Rydberg atoms can be improved via suppression of the motion-induced dephasing between the ground state and Rydberg states of neutral atoms. This dephasing often occurs during the gap time when the atom is shelved in a Rydberg state before its deexcitation. This paper presents two theories about how to suppress this dephasing. First, by using laser fields to induce a specific extra phase change in the Rydberg state during the gap time, it is possible to faithfully transfer the Rydberg state back to the ground state after the gap. Although the Rydberg state transitions back and forth between different eigenstates during the gap time, it preserves the blockade interaction between the atom of interest and a nearby Rydberg excitation. This simple method of suppressing the motional dephasing of a flying Rydberg atom can be used in a broad range of methods of quantum control of neutral atoms. Second, we find that the motional dephasing can also be suppressed by using a transition in a ``V''-type dual-rail configuration. The left (right) arm of this ``V'' represents a transition to a Rydberg state
∣r1(2)⟩ with a Rabi frequency $\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Omega}}{e}^{ikz}\phantom{\rule{0.2em}{0ex}}(\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Omega}}{e}^{\ensuremath{-}ikz})$, where
z is frozen without atomic drift, but changes linearly in each experimental cycle. Such a configuration is equivalent to a transition between the ground state and a hybrid time-dependent Rydberg state with a Rabi frequency $\sqrt{2}\mathrm{\ensuremath{\Omega}}$, such that there is no phase error whenever the state returns to the ground state. We study two applications of the second theory: (i) it is possible to faithfully transfer the atomic state between a hyperfine ground state and Rydberg states
∣r1(2)⟩ with no gap time between the excitation and deexcitation; and (ii) if infrared laser fields are added to induce a transition between
∣r1(2)⟩ and a nearby Rydberg state
∣r3⟩ via a greatly detuned low-lying intermediate state during the gap time, the atom can keep its internal state in the Rydberg level as well as adjust the population branching in
∣r1(2)⟩ during the gap time. This allows an almost perfect Rydberg deexcitation after the gap time, making it possible to recover a high fidelity in a Rydberg blockade gate. These theories pave the way for high-fidelity quantum control over neutral Rydberg atoms without cooling qubits to motional ground states in optical traps.
We demonstrate that the coherence of a single mobile atomic qubit can be well preserved during a transfer process among different optical dipole traps (ODTs). This is a prerequisite step in realizing a large-scale neutral atom quantum information processing platform. A qubit encoded in the hyperfine manifold of an ^{87}Rb atom is dynamically extracted from the static quantum register by an auxiliary moving ODT and reinserted into the static ODT. Previous experiments were limited by decoherences induced by the differential light shifts of qubit states. Here, we apply a magic-intensity trapping technique which mitigates the detrimental effects of light shifts and substantially enhances the coherence time to 225±21 ms. The experimentally demonstrated magic trapping technique relies on the previously neglected hyperpolarizability contribution to the light shifts, which makes the light shift dependence on the trapping laser intensity parabolic. Because of the parabolic dependence, at a certain "magic" intensity, the first order sensitivity to trapping light-intensity variations over ODT volume is eliminated. We experimentally demonstrate the utility of this approach and measure hyperpolarizability for the first time. Our results pave the way for constructing scalable quantum-computing architectures with single atoms trapped in an array of magic ODTs.
In the fields of quantum metrology and quantum information processing with the system of optically trapped single neutral atoms, the coherence time of a qubit encoded in the electronic states is regarded as one of the most important parameters. A longer coherence time is always pursued for higher precision of measurement and quantum manipulation. The coherence time is usually assumed to be merely determined by the relative stability of the energy between the electronic states, and the analysis of the decoherence was conducted by treating the atom motion classically. We proposed a complete description of the decoherence of a qubit encoded in two ground electronic states of an optically trapped alkali atom by adopting a full description of the atomic wavefunction. The motional state, i.e., the phonon state, is taken into account. In addition to decoherence due to the variance of the differential light shift (DLS), a new, to our knowledge, decoherence mechanism, phonon-jumping-induced decoherence (PJID), was discovered and verified experimentally. The coherence time of a single-cesium-atom qubit can be extended to T 2 ≈20s by suppressing both the variances of DLS and PJID by trapping the atom in a blue-detuned bottle beam trap (BBT) and preparing the atom in its three-dimensional motional ground states. The coherence time is the longest for a qubit encoded in an optically trapped single alkali atom. Our work provides a deep understanding of the decoherence mechanism for single atom qubits and thus provides a new way to extend the coherence time limit. The method can be applied for other atoms and molecules, opening up new prospects for high-precision control of the quantum states of optically trapped atoms or molecules.
We study the deterministic entanglement of a pair of neutral atoms trapped in an optical lattice by coupling to excited-state molecular hyperfine potentials. Information can be encoded in the ground-state hyperfine levels and processed by bringing atoms together pairwise to perform quantum logical operations through induced electric dipole-dipole interactions. The possibility of executing both diagonal- and exchange-type entangling gates is demonstrated for two three-level atoms and a figure of merit is derived for the fidelity of entanglement. The fidelity for executing a CPHASE gate is calculated for two
87Rb atoms, including hyperfine structure and finite atomic localization. The main source of decoherence is spontaneous emission, which can be minimized for interaction times fast compared to the scattering rate and for sufficiently separated atomic wave packets. Additionally, coherent couplings to states outside the logical basis can be constrained by the state-dependent trapping potential.
Abstract The Doppler dephasing error due to residual thermal motion of atoms is a major cause of infidelity in neutral-atom quantum gates. Besides cooling and trapping advancements, few effective methods exist to mitigate this error. In the present work, we first propose an error-erasing strategy that utilizes a pair of off-resonant fields to continuously dress the protected Rydberg state with an auxiliary state, which can induce an opposite but enhanced sensitivity to the same source of Doppler dephasing error. Combining with the optimal control of laser pulses, we have realized a family of Rydberg two-qubit controlled-NOT gates in Rb and Cs atoms that are fully immune to the Doppler dephasing error. We numerically simulate this gate operation with fidelity F ≈ 0.9906 at any temperature for a lower-excited auxiliary state, and a higher fidelity of F ≈ 0.9960 can be attained for a ground auxiliary state even at a temperature of 500 µK. Finally, we predict a super-high fidelity of F > 0.9999 for 50 μ K is possible by using the robust pulses with a larger amplitude. Our results significantly reduce atomic temperature requirements for high-fidelity quantum gates, and may provide fundamental guidance to practical fault-tolerant quantum computing with neutral atoms.