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arXiv:2302.10855 · Physical Review Letters

Dark-State Enhanced Loading of an Optical Tweezer Array

Adam L. Shaw, Pascal Scholl, Ran Finklestein, Ivaylo S. Madjarov, Brandon Grinkemeyer, Manuel Endres

Published May 12, 2023• 20 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Neutral atoms and molecules trapped in optical tweezers have become a prevalent resource for quantum simulation, computation, and metrology. However, the maximum achievable system sizes of such arrays are often limited by the stochastic nature of loading into optical tweezers, with a typical loading probability of only 50%. Here we present a species-agnostic method for dark-state enhanced loading (DSEL) based on real-time feedback, long-lived shelving states, and iterated array reloading. We demonstrate this technique with a 95-tweezer array of ^{88}Sr atoms, achieving a maximum loading probability of 84.02(4)% and a maximum array size of 91 atoms in one dimension. Our protocol is complementary to, and compatible with, existing schemes for enhanced loading based on direct control over light-assisted collisions, and we predict it can enable close-to-unity filling for arrays of atoms or molecules.

DOI
10.1103/physrevlett.130.193402

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Neutral atoms and molecules trapped in optical tweezers have become a prevalent resource for quantum simulation, computation, and metrology. However, the maximum achievable system sizes of such arrays are often limited by the stochastic nature of loading into optical tweezers, with a typical loading probability of only 50%. Here we present a species-agnostic method for dark-state enhanced loading (DSEL) based on real-time feedback, long-lived shelving states, and iterated array reloading. We demonstrate this technique with a 95-tweezer array of ^{88}Sr atoms, achieving a maximum loading probability of 84.02(4)% and a maximum array size of 91 atoms in one dimension. Our protocol is complementary to, and compatible with, existing schemes for enhanced loading based on direct control over light-assisted collisions, and we predict it can enable close-to-unity filling for arrays of atoms or molecules.
We introduce a method for improved loading into a single-atom optical tweezer array, utilizing iterative loading with multiple reservoir tweezers. Demonstrated with dual-wavelength tweezer arrays of Sr 88 atoms, our approach achieves a 96 % loading rate after four reload cycles. This method can significantly enhance existing tweezer rearrangement protocols and reduce optical power consumption for target tweezer arrays, thereby enabling a larger number of atoms in a quantum logic device. Our approach has the potential for implementation with different atomic species and combination with other enhanced loading methods.
Optical tweezers are a powerful tool for creating defect-free arrays of atoms and molecules, enabling advances in quantum simulation, computation, and precision metrology. However, the achievable array size is limited by the initial loading fraction, typically 50 %50\,\%50% for atoms and 35 %35\,\%35% for molecules. Here, we propose a general scheme for enabling multiple loading cycles by protecting trapped particles using a repulsive barrier. We show that collision-limited lifetimes of particles in protected tweezers can exceed one second, leading to filling fractions of over 80%80\%80% after four loading cycles. Combined with existing rearrangement techniques, this approach enables efficient unity filling of tweezer arrays and provides a scalable pathway towards larger quantum technology platforms.
Abstract Arrays of neutral atoms in optical tweezers are widely used in quantum simulation and computation, and precision frequency metrology. The capabilities of these arrays are enhanced by maximising the number of available sites. Here we increase the spatial extent of a two-dimensional array of 88 Sr atoms by sweeping the frequency of the cooling light to move the atomic reservoir across the array. We load arrays with vertical heights of > 100 µm, exceeding the height of an array loaded from a static reservoir by a factor of > 3. We investigate the site-to-site atom number distribution, tweezer lifetime, and temperature, achieving an average temperature across the array of 1.49 ( 3 ) µK. By controlling the frequency sweep we show it is possible to control the distribution of atoms across the array, including uniform and non-uniformly loaded arrays, and arrays with selectively loaded regions. We explain our results using a rate equation model which is in qualitative agreement with the data.
Assembling and maintaining large arrays of individually addressable atoms is a key requirement for continued scaling of neutral-atom-based quantum computers and simulators. In this work, we demonstrate a new paradigm for assembly of atomic arrays, based on a synergistic combination of optical tweezers and cavity-enhanced optical lattices, and the incremental filling of a target array from a repetitively filled reservoir. In this protocol, the tweezers provide microscopic rearrangement of atoms, while the cavity-enhanced lattices enable the creation of large numbers of optical traps with sufficient depth for rapid low-loss imaging of atoms. We apply this protocol to demonstrate near-deterministic filling (99% per-site occupancy) of 1225-site arrays of optical traps. Because the reservoir is repeatedly filled with fresh atoms, the array can be maintained in a filled state indefinitely. We anticipate that this protocol will be compatible with mid-circuit reloading of atoms into a quantum processor, which will be a key capability for running large-scale error-corrected quantum computations whose durations exceed the lifetime of a single atom in the system. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
Neutral atom arrays have emerged as a powerful platform for quantum computation, simulation, and metrology.Among them, alkaline-earth-like atoms exhibit distinct advantages, including long coherence time, high-fidelity Rydberg gates, and erasure correction for efficient quantum error correction. However, their scalability has lagged behind that of the alkali atoms. Here, we report 2400 ytterbium-174 atoms trapped in an optical tweezer array with enhanced loading efficiency of 83.5(1)\% via blue-detuned light-assisted collisions. We develop a quantitative model of the collision dynamics and find good agreement between the calculated inelastic collision rates and the experimentally measured loading efficiencies.Notably, the loading efficiency is largely maintained for array sizes ranging from dozens to thousands, exhibiting excellent scalability. We further demonstrate that the enhancement exists robustly across a range of interatomic potentials, suggesting its utility for other atomic species. To establish the capability of the 174^{174}174Yb arrays toward universal quantum computation, we propose to encode the qubit in the ground-clock state manifold and estimate a 99.9\% two-qubit gate fidelity with experimentally feasible parameters. Our work advances the prospects for realizing large-scale quantum computers using alkaline-earth-like atoms.
Scaling the size of assembled neutral-atom arrays trapped in optical lattices or optical tweezers is an enabling step for a number of applications ranging from quantum simulations to quantum metrology. However, preparation times increase with system size and constitute a severe bottleneck in the bottom-up assembly of large ordered arrays from stochastically loaded optical traps. Here we demonstrate a method to circumvent this bottleneck by recycling atoms from one experimental run to the next, while continuously reloading and adding atoms to the array. Using this approach, we achieve densely packed arrays with more than 1000 atoms stored in an optical lattice, continuously refilled with a 3.5 s cycle time and about 130 atoms reloaded during each cycle. Furthermore, we show that we can continuously maintain such large arrays by simply reloading atoms that are lost from one cycle to the next. Our approach paves the way towards quantum science with large ordered atomic arrays containing thousands of atoms in continuous operation. Published by the American Physical Society 2024