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Tenth International Conference on Information Optics and Photonics

Ion shuttling based on accurate potential control technology

Mengliang Xu, Yi Xie, Ting Chen, Jie Zhang, Manchao Zhang, Wenbo Su, Xie-Qian Li, Ting Zhang, Wei Wu, Ping‐Xing Chen

Published Nov 24, 2023• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

We have developed fast and accurate protocols for ion shuttling in a surface-electrode ion trap, which allows efficient splitting and merging of two ions. These protocols are based on innovative improvements in the driving potential field model, where voltage is introduced as a variable parameter. This enhancement specifically addresses the issue of increased control errors that occur with larger inter-ion distances. We have devised a general model-solving procedure that uses a parameterized model to describe the total potential energy of the two ions and ions oscillating eigenfrequency in a dynamical normal modes. By employing optimization techniques, we determine optimal voltage ramps for the dynamic potential field, enabling accurate control of physical quantities during the splitting process. In additionally, through simulating the classical dynamics of the theoretical scheme, we decouple the ion oscillations by employing discrete Fourier transform (DFT) and nonlinear fitting techniques. Two ions are separated into individual potential wells with a distance of 200 μ𝑚 within 50 μs. The ion position drift is only 0.01%. During the splitting process, the frequency fluctuation of the center-of-mass mode of the ions is less than 0.69%, and the minimum average excitation of a single ion is 0.02 phonon. Accurate and fast ion shuttling technology facilitates the development of large-scale trapped-ion quantum computing. Maintaining the ions oscillating eigenfrequency constant during the shuttling operation alleviates the problem of decoherence of quantum information.

DOI
10.1117/12.3007674

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We have developed fast and accurate protocols for ion shuttling in a surface-electrode ion trap, which allows efficient splitting and merging of two ions. These protocols are based on innovative improvements in the driving potential field model, where voltage is introduced as a variable parameter. This enhancement specifically addresses the issue of increased control errors that occur with larger inter-ion distances. We have devised a general model-solving procedure that uses a parameterized model to describe the total potential energy of the two ions and ions oscillating eigenfrequency in a dynamical normal modes. By employing optimization techniques, we determine optimal voltage ramps for the dynamic potential field, enabling accurate control of physical quantities during the splitting process. In additionally, through simulating the classical dynamics of the theoretical scheme, we decouple the ion oscillations by employing discrete Fourier transform (DFT) and nonlinear fitting techniques. Two ions are separated into individual potential wells with a distance of 200 μ𝑚 within 50 μs. The ion position drift is only 0.01%. During the splitting process, the frequency fluctuation of the center-of-mass mode of the ions is less than 0.69%, and the minimum average excitation of a single ion is 0.02 phonon. Accurate and fast ion shuttling technology facilitates the development of large-scale trapped-ion quantum computing. Maintaining the ions oscillating eigenfrequency constant during the shuttling operation alleviates the problem of decoherence of quantum information.
Scalable trapped-ion quantum computing requires fast and reliable transport of ions through complex, segmented radiofrequency trap architectures without inducing excessive motional excitation. We present a numerical toolchain for the systematic generation of time-dependent electrode voltages enabling fast, low-excitation ion shuttling in segmented radiofrequency traps. Based on a model of the trap electrode geometry, the framework combines an electrostatic field solver, efficient unconstrained optimization, waveform postprocessing, and dynamical simulations of ion motion to compute voltage waveforms that realize prescribed transport trajectories while respecting experimental constraints, such as voltage limits and bandwidth. The toolchain supports arbitrary trap geometries, including junctions and multi-zone layouts, and allows for the flexible incorporation of optimization objectives. We provide a detailed assessment of the accuracy of the framework by investigating its numerical stability and by comparing measured and predicted secular frequencies. The framework is optimized for numerical performance, enabling rapid numerical prototyping of trap architectures of increasing complexity. As application examples, we apply the framework to the transport of a potential well along a linear, uniformly segmented trap, and we compute a solution for shuttling a potential well around the corner of an X-type trap junction. The presented approach provides an extensible and highly efficient numerical foundation for designing and validating transport protocols in current and next-generation trapped-ion processors.
Scalable trapped-ion quantum computing requires fast and reliable transport of ions through complex, segmented radiofrequency trap architectures without inducing excessive motional excitation. We present a numerical toolchain for the systematic generation of time-dependent electrode voltages enabling fast, low-excitation ion shuttling in segmented radiofrequency traps. Based on a model of the trap electrode geometry, the framework combines an electrostatic field solver, efficient unconstrained optimization, waveform postprocessing, and dynamical simulations of ion motion to compute voltage waveforms that realize prescribed transport trajectories while respecting experimental constraints such as voltage limits and bandwidth. The toolchain supports arbitrary trap geometries, including junctions and multi-zone layouts, and allows for the flexible incorporation of optimization objectives. We provide a detailed assessment of the accuracy of the framework by investigating its numerical stability and by comparing measured and predicted secular frequencies. The framework is optimized for numerical performance, enabling rapid numerical prototyping of trap architectures of increasing complexity. As application examples, we apply the framework to the transport of a potential well along a linear, uniformly segmented trap, and we compute a solution for shuttling a potential well around the corner of an X-type trap junction. The presented approach provides an extensible and highly efficient numerical foundation for designing and validating transport protocols in current and next-generation trapped-ion processors.
Abstract A large-scale ion trap array fabricated using the microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) technology is expected to be a promising device for building a practical quantum computer. Shuttling trapped ions is essential for operating scalable ion trap structures. This paper proposes an ion shuttling method for a MEMS-fabricated surface ion trap. Change of secular frequency of trapping potential can cause heating and subsequent loss of ions. Therefore, direct current voltage sets to form uniform ion trapping potentials around the ions while shuttling are calculated by simulations. A 32-channel digital-to-analog converter system is developed to apply the calculated voltage sets to the electrodes of the MEMS-fabricated surface ion trap. The shuttling process is experimented using trapped 174Yb+ ions. The successful round trip of the ion for 1920 μm is demonstrated using the developed approach.
We theoretically investigate the process of splitting two-ion crystals in segmented Paul traps, i.e. the structural transition from two ions confined in a common well to ions confined in separate wells. The precise control of this process by application of suitable voltage ramps to the trap segments is non-trivial, as the harmonic confinement transiently vanishes during the process. This makes the ions strongly susceptible to background electric field noise, and to static offset fields in the direction of the trap axis. We analyze the reasons why large energy transfers can occur, which are impulsive acceleration, the presence of residual background fields and enhanced anomalous heating. For the impulsive acceleration, we identify the diabatic and adiabatic regimes, which are characterized by different scaling behavior of the energy transfer with respect to time. We propose a suitable control scheme based on experimentally accessible parameters. Simulations are used to verify both the high sensitivity of the splitting result and the performance of our control scheme. Finally, we analyze the impact of trap geometry parameters on the crystal splitting process.
With the increasing number of ion qubits and improving performance of sophisticated quantum algorithms, more and more scalable complex ion trap electrodes have been developed and integrated. Nonlinear ion shuttling operations at the junction are more frequently used, such as in the areas of separation, merging, and exchanging. Several studies have been conducted to optimize the geometries of the radio-frequency (RF) electrodes to generate ideal trapping electric fields with a lower junction barrier and an even ion height of the RF saddle points. However, this iteration is time-consuming and commonly accompanied by complicated and sharp electrode geometry. Therefore, high-accuracy fabrication process and high electric breakdown voltage are essential. In the current work, an effective method was proposed to reduce the junction's pseudo-potential barrier and ion height variation by setting several individual RF electrodes and adjusting each RF voltage amplitude without changing the geometry of the electrode structure. The simulation results show that this method shows the same effect on engineering the trapping potential and reducing the potential barrier, but requires fewer parameters and optimization time. By combining this method with the geometrical shape-optimizing, the pseudo-potential barrier and the ion height variation near the junction can be further reduced. In addition, the geometry of the electrodes can be simplified to relax the fabrication precision and keep the ability to engineer the trapping electric field in real-time even after the fabrication of the electrodes, which provides a potential all-electric degree of freedom for the design and control of the two-dimensional ion crystals and investigation of their phase transition.
Abstract Shuttling ions at high speed and with low motional excitation is essential for realizing fast and high-fidelity algorithms in many trapped-ion-based quantum computing architectures. Achieving such performance is challenging due to the sensitivity of an ion to electric fields and the unknown and imperfect environmental and control variables that create them. Here we implement a closed-loop optimization of the voltage waveforms that control the trajectory and axial frequency of an ion during transport in order to minimize the final motional excitation. The resulting waveforms realize fast round-trip transport of a trapped ion across multiple electrodes at speeds of 0.5 electrodes per microsecond (35 m·s −1 for a one-way transport of 210 μm in 6 μs) with a maximum of 0.36 ± 0.08 mean quanta gain. This sub-quanta gain is independent of the phase of the secular motion at the distal location, obviating the need for an electric field impulse or time delay to eliminate the coherent motion.