Longitudinal coupling, which generates entanglement without energy exchange, has extensive applications in quantum computing and quantum simulation. However, achieving available direct and flexible longitudinal couplings between highly coherent superconducting qubits is challenging. In this study, a method is developed to achieve direct and flexible longitudinal couplings between superconducting qubits, including the direct longitudinal coupling between capacitively shunted flux qubits (C‐shunt flux qubits) and that between transmon qubits. Herein, first, a variant of the prototype C‐shunt flux qubit, the concentric C‐shunt flux qubit, is introduced. It is demonstrated that the large mutual inductance between concentric C‐shunt flux qubits produces a longitudinal coupling strength up to 21 MHz. It is also demonstrated that the method can be used to realize a strong longitudinal coupling between two transmon qubits. In the findings, it is demonstrated that it is possible to achieve a flexible and efficient direct longitudinal coupling between superconducting qubits, and open up new possibilities for the development of quantum gate operation methods as well as quantum simulation methods.
Longitudinal coupling, which generates entanglement without energy exchange, has extensive applications in quantum computing and quantum simulation. However, achieving available direct and flexible longitudinal couplings between highly coherent superconducting qubits is challenging. In this study, a method is developed to achieve direct and flexible longitudinal couplings between superconducting qubits, including the direct longitudinal coupling between capacitively shunted flux qubits (C‐shunt flux qubits) and that between transmon qubits. Herein, first, a variant of the prototype C‐shunt flux qubit, the concentric C‐shunt flux qubit, is introduced. It is demonstrated that the large mutual inductance between concentric C‐shunt flux qubits produces a longitudinal coupling strength up to 21 MHz. It is also demonstrated that the method can be used to realize a strong longitudinal coupling between two transmon qubits. In the findings, it is demonstrated that it is possible to achieve a flexible and efficient direct longitudinal coupling between superconducting qubits, and open up new possibilities for the development of quantum gate operation methods as well as quantum simulation methods.
Superconducting qubits are among the most promising and versatile building blocks on the road to a functioning quantum computer. One of the main challenges in superconducting qubit architectures is to couple qubits in a well-controlled manner, especially in circuit constructions that involve many qubits. In order to avoid unwanted cross-couplings, qubits are oftentimes coupled via harmonic resonators, which act as buses that mediate the interaction. This thesis is set in the framework of superconducting transmon-type qubit architectures with special focus on two important types of coupling between qubits and harmonic resonators: transverse and longitudinal coupling. While transverse coupling naturally appears in transmon-like circuit constructions, longitudinal coupling is much harder to implement and hardly ever the only coupling term present. Nevertheless, we will see that longitudinal coupling offers some remarkable advantages with respect to scalability and readout. This thesis will focus on a design, which combines both these coupling types in a single circuit and provides the possibility to choose between pure transverse and pure longitudinal or have both at the same time. The ability to choose between transverse and longitudinal coupling in the same circuit provides the flexibility to use one for coupling to the next qubit and one for readout, or vice versa. We will start with an introduction to circuit quantization, where we will explain how to describe and analyze superconducting electrical circuits in a systematic way and discuss which characteristic circuit elements make up qubits and resonators. We will then introduce the two types of coupling between qubit and resonator which are provided in our design: transverse and longitudinal coupling. In order to show that longitudinal coupling has some remarkable advantages with respect to the scalability of a circuit, we will discuss a scalable qubit architecture, which can be implemented with our design. Translating this discussion from the Hamiltonian level to the language of circuit quantization, we will show how to design circuits with specifically tailored couplings. Having introduced these basic concepts, we will focus on our circuit design that consists of an inductively shunted transmon qubit with tunable coupling to an embedded harmonic mode. Using a symmetric design, static transverse coupling terms are canceled out, while the parity of the only remaining coupling term can be tuned via an external flux. The distinctive feature of the tunable design is that the transverse coupling disappears when the longitudinal is maximal and vice versa. Subsequently, we will turn to the implementation of our circuit design, discuss how to choose the parameters, and present an adapted alternative circuit, where coupling strength and anharmonicity scale better than in the original circuit. Furthermore, we show how the anharmonicity and the coupling can be boosted by additional flux-biasing. We will see that for conveniently chosen parameters longitudinal and transverse coupling have comparable values, while all other coupling terms can be suppressed. In addition, we present a proposal for an experimental device that will serve as a prototype for a first experiment. Coming back to the scalable architecture mentioned above, we will show how our design can be scaled up to a grid, which can be done in modular fashion with strictly local couplings. In such a grid of fixed-frequency qubits and resonators with a particular pattern of always-on interactions, coupling is strictly confined to nearest and next-nearest neighbor resonators; there is never any direct qubit-qubit coupling. We will conclude the thesis discussing different possibilities to do readout with our circuit design, including a short discussion of the coupling between the circuit and the environment, and the influence of dissipation.
We present the design of an inductively shunted transmon qubit with flux-tunable coupling to an embedded harmonic mode. This circuit construction offers the possibility to flux-choose between pure transverse and pure longitudinal coupling, that is, coupling to the ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{x}$ or ${\ensuremath{\sigma}}_{z}$ degree of freedom of the qubit. While transverse coupling is the coupling type that is most commonly used for superconducting qubits, the inherently different longitudinal coupling has some remarkable advantages both for readout and for the scalability of a circuit. Being able to choose between both kinds of coupling in the same circuit provides the flexibility to use one for coupling to the next qubit and one for readout, or vice versa. We provide a detailed analysis of the system's behavior using realistic parameters, along with a proposal for the physical implementation of a prototype device.
While quantum computation has the potential to revolutionize the scientific community, to date no architecture has been developed which offers the necessary combination of high coherence times and massive scalability. Superconducting flux qubits satisfy the second requirement well but to date useful devices are limited to coherence times of typically only a few &mus. In this dissertation we examine the possibilities of improving the coherence performance of the flux qubit to the levels required for fault-tolerant quantum computation. We find that coherence times for many devices are limited by photon-induced quasiparticles and mitigation of these quasiparticles increases coherence times by more than a factor of two. Beyond this, however, we find little improvement in flux qubit performance compared to prior results. Despite improved fabrication techniques and varied device designs we find flux qubit coherence times are still typically below 5 &mus. Furthermore, wide device-to-device variations are observed which prevent effective scaling of the flux qubit to quantum information circuits.Based on the proposal by You, et al. we develop of a capacitively-shunted version of the flux qubit called the C-shunt flux qubit. With the addition of a capacitive shunt across the small junction of the flux qubit we are able to reduce the amplitude sensitivity to both charge and flux noise by more than a factor of three. The result is a predicted ten-fold enhancement in the coherence times compared to the unshunted flux qubit. At the same time we preserve much of the anharmonicity of the flux qubit resulting in a device with coherence times comparable to modern transmons but with a factor of four better anharmonicity and more flexible coupling configurations.By using a high-quality MBE aluminum shunt process on an annealed sapphire substrate coupled with a more conventional electron-beam-evaporated aluminum Josephson junction process we fabricate hybrid C-shunt flux qubits. We also incorporate a new bridgeless junction technique which offers more robust and repeatable fabrication processing. This technique enables improved accuracy of the junction sizing, a trait which will become essential as we move to multi-qubit experiments. T1 and T2 times for these C-shunt devices reach in excess of 40 &mus at degeneracy, achieving the predicted ten-fold improvement based on the reduced noise sensitivity. At the same time we see decreased device-to-device variation with typical T1 times exceeding 20&ndash25 &mus at all bias points. Combined with the high anharmonicity and standard planar fabrication techniques these coherence times make the C-shunt flux qubit a competitive candidate for fault-tolerant quantum computation.
Abstract Inductively shunted transmon qubits(IST) have emerged as one of the most promising candidates for superconducting quantum computing, exhibiting remarkable resilience to both charge and flux noise as a qubit. In this work, we investigate, analytically and numerically, the potential of the IST as a coupler. Compared to the conventional transmon couplers, significant advantages due to the addition of an inductive shunt is revealed, and the unique flux-tunability makes it an ideal candidate for implementing coupling between two transmons. Moreover, a novel coupling circuit is investigated through numerical simulations, demonstrates high-contrast switching of qubit–qubit interactions under the control of an external flux, realizing a two-qubit controlled-Z (CZ) gate with an average fidelity above 99.99%.
Superconducting quantum computing is a solid state quantum computing technology based on Josephson junction circuits. It becomes one of the most promising candidates for realizing practical quantum computer/simulator, because of its scalability, easy to coupling and control, compatibility to semiconductor technologies, etc. As the complicated electromagnetic environment in solid state metal and insulator, superconducting quantum bits (qubits) suffered from shot coherence time since its early development. In this review, we described some recently developed superconducting qubit structures, including Transmon/Xmon, Fluxonium and C-shunt flux qubit. Although these new qubit structures have very different circuit parameters and energy scales, they all find their way to effectively suppress environmental noises. As a result, their coherence time were improved significantly. Transmon, a transmission-line shunted plasma oscillation qubit, was now among the most popular structures for building a multi-qubit superconducting quantum circuit. It introduced a relatively large shunt capacitor to remarkably reduce the charge dispersion. Although the non-linearity is also decreased, by operating in a properly chosen EJ/Ec, transmon can greatly reduce the charge noise while only sacrificing a small amount of non-linearity. Xmon can be considered as a modified version of transmon. It is designed and optimized for multi-qubit operation and measurement with separate X/Y and Z control lines for each qubit, and a readout bus (a transmission line or a low-Q bandpass filter) for simultaneous readout of all the qubits. Fluxonium provide another solution for suppressing the charge noise in Cooper-pair box (CPB). It introduces a large shunt inductance to filter low-frequency offset charge in the small capacitor of the phase-slip junction (the small junction). To keep the qubit operating in the charge region, the shunt inductor should be large enough to keep the impedance larger than the superconducting impedance quantum RQ~1 kΩ. As a result, the inductance can only be provided by a large series of Josephson junctions. Fluxonium keeps the advantage of high anharmonicity of CPB. In addition, it introduces another degree of freedom: external flux Φext. Quasiparticles (electrons or holes) tunneling at the small junction add coherently to produce a ″1+cosφ″ term. As a result, when Φext= Φ0/2, dissipation caused by quasiparticle tunneling is suppressed and the energy relaxation time (T1) increases drastically. C-shunt flux qubit (CSFQ) decreases α and EJ to suppress flux noise in the qubit. While the charge noise becomes the dominant noise source, a large shunt capacitor is added to suppress the charge noise, similar to that in a transmon qubit. It is worth to notice that in CSFQ, the α decreases to below but near 1/2. As a result, the double-well potential no longer exists. The energy structure become similar to transmon, with the anharmonicity be opposite. CSFQ can get a much improved coherence time, while its anharmonicity can be larger than that of transmon. Those new superconducting qubit structures provide different solutions to improve the coherence time. Although it looks much different in circuit models and parameters, they have ideas in common, and may act as guides to other novel designs with longer coherence time. We can summarize as below. (1) The qubit circuit should be free of small superconducting islands. Charge fluctuation in small islands is a major source of decoherence. As a result, increase the area of the islands, that is, increase the capacitance becomes a straight forward way to suppress the charge noise. In Fluxonium, the small junction is connected with a large series of large junctions that there is also no small islands in the whole loop. (2) Remove superconducting loops in the qubit circuit, or minimize the loop size and loop current to suppress flux noise. (3) Bias the phase difference of the small junction to π, where dissipation caused by quasiparticle tunneling can be suppressed coherently. (4) Decrease the coupling bandwidth of qubit to the environment. In a circuit-QED readout scheme, a high-Q readout resonator that dispersively coupled to the qubit protects the qubit from exposed to the electromagnetic environment of the readout circuit. A ″Purcell filter″ can also be added to suppress such decoherence further. In conclusion, we overviewed some qubit engineering techniques or ideas to improve the coherence time, which is a very important figure for building practical quantum computer/simulator. We hope that someone can combine and optimize these ideas, while interact with developments in materials and micro-fabrication technologies, to develop novel new generation superconducting qubit structures in the near future.
Interqubit coupling and qubit connectivity in a processor are crucial for achieving high-fidelity multiqubit gates and efficient implementation of quantum algorithms. Typical superconducting processors employ relatively weak transverse interqubit coupling which is activated via frequency tuning or microwave drives. Here, we propose a class of multimode superconducting circuits which realize multiple transmon qubits with all-to-all longitudinal coupling. These ``artificial molecules'' directly implement a multidimensional Hilbert space that can be easily manipulated due to the always-on longitudinal coupling. We describe the basic technique to analyze such circuits, compute the relevant properties, and discuss how to optimize them to create efficient small-scale quantum processors with universal programmability.