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IEEE International Conference on Quantum Computing and Engineering (QCE)

Multiplexed Control at Scale for Electrode Arrays in Trapped-Ion Quantum Processors

Ryutaro Ohira, Shinichi Morisaka, Ippei Nakamura, Atsushi Noguchi, Takefumi Miyoshi

Published Aug 30, 2025• 1 citation
Publisher

Abstract

The scaling up of trapped-ion quantum processors based on the quantum charge-coupled device (QCCD) architecture is difficult owing to the extensive electronics and high-density wiring required to control numerous trap electrodes. In conventional QCCD architectures, each trap electrode is controlled via a dedicated digital-to-analog converter (DAC). The conventional approach places an overwhelming demand on electronic resources and wiring complexity. This is because the number of trap electrodes typically exceeds the number of trapped-ion qubits. This study proposes a method that leverages a high-speed DAC to generate time-division multiplexed signals to control a large-scale QCCD trapped-ion quantum processor. The proposed method replaces conventional DACs with a single high-speed DAC that generates the complete voltage waveforms required to control the trap electrodes, thereby significantly reducing the wiring complexity and overall resource requirements. Based on realistic parameters and commercially available electronics, our analysis demonstrates that a QCCD trapped-ion quantum computer with$\mathbf{1 0, 0 0 0}$trap electrodes can be controlled using only 13 field-programmable gate arrays and 104 high-speed DACs. This is in stark contrast to the$\mathbf{1 0, 0 0 0}$dedicated DACs required by conventional control methods. Consequently, employing this approach, we developed a proof-of-concept electronic system and evaluated its analog output performance.

DOI
10.1109/qce65121.2025.00150

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•Mar 14, 2014•1 citation
The scaling up of trapped-ion quantum processors based on the quantum charge-coupled device (QCCD) architecture is difficult owing to the extensive electronics and high-density wiring required to control numerous trap electrodes. In conventional QCCD architectures, each trap electrode is controlled via a dedicated digital-to-analog converter (DAC). The conventional approach places an overwhelming demand on electronic resources and wiring complexity. This is because the number of trap electrodes typically exceeds the number of trapped-ion qubits. This study proposes a method that leverages a high-speed DAC to generate time-division multiplexed signals to control a large-scale QCCD trapped-ion quantum processor. The proposed method replaces conventional DACs with a single high-speed DAC that generates the complete voltage waveforms required to control the trap electrodes, thereby significantly reducing the wiring complexity and overall resource requirements. Based on realistic parameters and commercially available electronics, our analysis demonstrates that a QCCD trapped-ion quantum computer with10,000\mathbf{1 0, 0 0 0}10,000trap electrodes can be controlled using only 13 field-programmable gate arrays and 104 high-speed DACs. This is in stark contrast to the10,000\mathbf{1 0, 0 0 0}10,000dedicated DACs required by conventional control methods. Consequently, employing this approach, we developed a proof-of-concept electronic system and evaluated its analog output performance.
Independent control of numerous electrodes in quantum charge-coupled device architectures presents a significant challenge for wiring and hardware scalability. To address this issue, we demonstrate a voltage control method based on time-division multiplexing (TDM). This approach utilizes a single high-update-rate digital-to-analog converter (DAC) to sequentially generate control signals for multiple electrodes, thereby reducing both the number of required DACs and associated wiring. We experimentally validate this concept by developing a 10-channel system that operates with only two DACs. The developed TDM-based voltage control system is applied to a surface electrode trap, where we successfully trap a single 40Ca+ ion and demonstrate a simple ion transport primitive. This approach offers a resource-efficient and scalable solution for advanced quantum computing systems based on trapped ions.
Trapped-ion quantum computers based on the quantum charge-coupled device architecture require on the order of ten trap electrodes per qubit, making the number of vacuum feedthroughs a bottleneck at the system scale. Time-division multiplexed (TDM)-based voltage control for trap electrodes provides a natural route to alleviate this constraint. However, previous studies have been limited to architectural proposals for static trap-potential compensation and room-temperature demonstrations of dynamic-electrode control, leaving cryogenic operation of TDM-based voltage control for static and dynamic electrodes experimentally unexplored. In this study, we develop and cryogenically validate TDM-based voltage control schemes for two distinct electrode classes. For static electrodes used in trap-potential compensation, we implement a 32-channel demultiplexed system operating at approximately 27~K, achieving an effective voltage update rate of 37.5~kHz with an output range of ±10 V\pm10~\mathrm{V}±10 V per channel. For dynamic electrodes used in ion operations, such as shuttling, we implement a four-channel demultiplexed system operating at approximately 14~K, achieving an effective voltage update rate of 1~MHz with a comparable output range. These results establish TDM-based voltage control as a practical approach for both electrode classes, providing a path for mitigating the vacuum feedthrough bottleneck in scalable trapped-ion quantum processors.
The quantum charge-coupled device (QCCD) is one of the notable architectures to achieve large-scale trapped-ion quantum computers. To realize QCCD architecture, ions must be transported quickly while minimizing motional excitation. High-voltage sources are necessary to achieve such high-quality ion transport through a high secular frequency. In this study, we report the development of a field programmable gate array-based digital-to-analog converter (DAC) system with an output voltage range of ±50 V and demonstrate its effectiveness in ion transport operations. The device provides a 16-channel analog output, a maximum update rate of 16 mega updates per second, a slew rate of 20 V/μs, and a bandwidth of >200 kHz. By optimizing the voltage sets with quadratic programming, we experimentally confirmed that this DAC system can achieve more than twice the secular frequency attainable when its output range is restricted to ±10 V, which is consistent with the fact that scaling all electrode voltages by a factor of 5 will scale the secular frequency by 5. Since the output range of many commercially available DACs is commonly limited to ±10 V, this increase is effective for ion-shuttling operations, such as transport, split, and merge. The developed DAC system has the potential to increase the speed of ion transport thereby reducing processing times in QCCD-based quantum computers.
Trapped-ion Quantum Charge-Coupled Devices (QCCD) are a leading contender for quantum computing, but their scalability is constrained by control wiring and electronics. Wiring using Integrated Switching Electronics (WISE), a recently proposed QCCD architecture, reduces wiring through multiplexing and integrated switching hardware. However, this leaves an execution model with limited parallelism and limited flexibility in ion movement. Further, these devices need to be paired with a quantum error correction (QEC) code to enable fault-tolerant quantum computation (FTQC). Can WISE architectures efficiently support FTQC requirements? Which QEC choices, device and control parameters are practical? We present WISER, a cross-layer design-space exploration framework for trapped-ion systems with multiplexed control. WISER combines a WISE-specific SAT-based compiler, a physics-informed noise model and logical-memory simulation to estimate logical error rates, logical clock speeds and control power across hardware parameters and QEC families. Its compiler reduces routing time by 2.62.62.6--18.8×18.8\times18.8× relative to a greedy WISE-compatible baseline. Our analysis provides concrete design guidance. Two-ion traps with 161616-way multiplexing, 8×8\times8× lower than the original WISE proposal, give the fastest logical clock that meets our reliability and cold-stage power targets. With current hardware parameters, the distance-7 surface code is the only evaluated code to meet our early-FTQC screen, at 4.58 4.58\,4.58Hz and 2.04 2.04\,2.04W of DAC power per logical qubit. At this operating point, ion transport and recooling take 949494--96%96\%96% of the WISE cycle, and even without them sample-and-hold electrode charging leaves millisecond-scale syndrome-extraction rounds.
The advent of microfabricated ion traps for the quantum information community has allowed research groups to build traps that incorporate an unprecedented number of trapping zones. However, as device complexity has grown, the number of digital-to-analog converter (DAC) channels needed to control these devices has grown as well, with some of the largest trap assemblies now requiring nearly one hundred DAC channels. Providing electrical connections for these channels into a vacuum chamber can be bulky and difficult to scale beyond the current numbers of trap electrodes. This paper reports on the development and testing of an in-vacuum DAC system that uses only 9 vacuum feedthrough connections to control a 78-electrode microfabricated ion trap. The system is characterized by trapping single and multiple (40)Ca(+) ions. The measured axial mode stability, ion heating rates, and transport fidelities for a trapped ion are comparable to systems with external (air-side) commercial DACs.
The advent of microfabricated ion traps for the quantum information community has allowed research groups to build traps that incorporate an unprecedented number of trapping zones. However, as device complexity has grown, the number of digital-to-analog converter (DAC) channels needed to control these devices has grown as well, with some of the largest trap assemblies now requiring nearly one hundred DAC channels. Providing electrical connections for these channels into a vacuum chamber can be bulky and difficult to scale beyond the current numbers of trap electrodes. This paper reports on the development and testing of an in-vacuum DAC system that uses only 9 vacuum feedthrough connections to control a 78-electrode microfabricated ion trap. The system is characterized by trapping single and multiple 40Ca ions. The measured axial mode stability, ion heating rates, and transport fidelities for a trapped ion are comparable to systems with external (air-side) National Instruments PXI-6733 DACs.