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arXiv:quant-ph/0106099 · Physical Review A

Sub-Riemannian geometry and time optimal control of three spin systems: Quantum gates and coherence transfer

Navin Khaneja, Steffen J. Glaser, Roger W. Brockett

Published Jan 30, 2002• 245 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Radio-frequency pulses are used in nuclear-magnetic-resonance spectroscopy to produce unitary transfer of states. Pulse sequences that accomplish a desired transfer should be as short as possible in order to minimize the effects of relaxation, and to optimize the sensitivity of the experiments. Many coherence-transfer experiments in NMR, involving a network of coupled spins, use temporary spin decoupling to produce desired effective Hamiltonians. In this paper, we demonstrate that significant time can be saved in producing an effective Hamiltonian if spin decoupling is avoided. We provide time-optimal pulse sequences for producing an important class of effective Hamiltonians in three-spin networks. These effective Hamiltonians are useful for coherence-transfer experiments in three-spin systems and implementation of indirect swap and ${\ensuremath{\Lambda}}_{2}(U)$ gates in the context of NMR quantum computing. It is shown that computing these time-optimal pulses can be reduced to geometric problems that involve computing sub-Riemannian geodesics. Using these geometric ideas, explicit expressions for the minimum time required for producing these effective Hamiltonians, transfer of coherence, and implementation of indirect swap gates, in a three-spin network are derived (Theorems 1 and 2). It is demonstrated that geometric control techniques provide a systematic way of finding time-optimal pulse sequences for transferring coherence and synthesizing unitary transformations in quantum networks, with considerable time savings (e.g., 42.3% for constructing indirect swap gates).

DOI
10.1103/physreva.65.032301

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Radio-frequency pulses are used in nuclear-magnetic-resonance spectroscopy to produce unitary transfer of states. Pulse sequences that accomplish a desired transfer should be as short as possible in order to minimize the effects of relaxation, and to optimize the sensitivity of the experiments. Many coherence-transfer experiments in NMR, involving a network of coupled spins, use temporary spin decoupling to produce desired effective Hamiltonians. In this paper, we demonstrate that significant time can be saved in producing an effective Hamiltonian if spin decoupling is avoided. We provide time-optimal pulse sequences for producing an important class of effective Hamiltonians in three-spin networks. These effective Hamiltonians are useful for coherence-transfer experiments in three-spin systems and implementation of indirect swap and \ensuremathΛ2(U){\ensuremath{\Lambda}}_{2}(U)\ensuremathΛ2​(U) gates in the context of NMR quantum computing. It is shown that computing these time-optimal pulses can be reduced to geometric problems that involve computing sub-Riemannian geodesics. Using these geometric ideas, explicit expressions for the minimum time required for producing these effective Hamiltonians, transfer of coherence, and implementation of indirect swap gates, in a three-spin network are derived (Theorems 1 and 2). It is demonstrated that geometric control techniques provide a systematic way of finding time-optimal pulse sequences for transferring coherence and synthesizing unitary transformations in quantum networks, with considerable time savings (e.g., 42.3% for constructing indirect swap gates).
In this paper, we study the design of pulse sequences for nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy as a problem of time optimal control of the unitary propagator. Radio-frequency pulses are used in coherent spectroscopy to implement a unitary transfer between states. Pulse sequences that accomplish a desired transfer should be as short as possible in order to minimize the effects of relaxation and to optimize the sensitivity of the experiments. Here, we give an analytical characterization of such time optimal pulse sequences applicable to coherence transfer experiments in multiple-spin systems. We have adopted a general mathematical formulation, and present many of our results in this setting, mindful of the fact that new structures in optimal pulse design are constantly arising. From a general control theory perspective, the problems we want to study have the following character. Suppose we are given a controllable right invariant system on a compact Lie group. What is the minimum time required to steer the system from some initial point to a specified final point? In nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy and quantum computing, this translates to, what is the minimum time required to produce a unitary propagator? We also give an analytical characterization of maximum achievable transfer in a given time for the two-spin system.
Experiments in coherent nuclear and electron magnetic resonance and quantum computing in general correspond to control of quantum-mechanical systems, guiding them from initial to final target states by unitary transformations. The control inputs (pulse sequences) that accomplish these unitary transformations should take as little time as possible so as to minimize the effects of relaxation and decoherence and to optimize the sensitivity of the experiments. Here, we derive a time-optimal sequences as fundamental building blocks to synthesize unitary transformations. Such sequences can be widely implemented on various physical systems, including the simulation of effective Hamiltonians for topological quantum computing on spin lattices. Experimental demonstrations are provided for a system consisting of three nuclear spins.
Experiments in coherent nuclear and electron magnetic resonance and optical spectroscopy correspond to control of quantum-mechanical ensembles, guiding them from initial states to target states by unitary transformations. The control inputs (pulse sequences) that accomplish these unitary transformations should take as little time as possible so as to minimize the effects of relaxation and decoherence, and to optimize the sensitivity of the experiments. Here, we give an efficient synthesis of a class of unitary transformations on a three coupled spin-12\frac{1}{2}21​ system with equal Ising coupling strengths. We show a significant time saving compared with conventional methods.
Experiments in coherent nuclear and electron magnetic resonance, and optical spectroscopy correspond to control of quantum mechanical ensembles, guiding them from initial to final target states by unitary transformations. The control inputs (pulse sequences) that accomplish these unitary transformations should take as little time as possible so as to minimize the effects of relaxation and decoherence and to optimize the sensitivity of the experiments. Here we give efficient syntheses of various unitary transformations on Ising spin chains of arbitrary length. The efficient realization of the unitary transformations presented here is obtained by computing geodesics on a sphere under a special metric. We show that contrary to the conventional belief, it is possible to propagate a spin order along an Ising spin chain with coupling strength JJJ (in units of Hz), significantly faster than ${(2J)}^{\ensuremath{-}1}$ per step. The methods presented here are expected to be useful for immediate and future applications involving control of spin dynamics in coherent spectroscopy and quantum information processing.
We study multiple-spin coherence transfers in linear Ising spin chains with nearest-neighbor couplings. These constitute a model for efficient information transfers in future quantum computing devices and for many multidimensional experiments for the assignment of complex spectra in nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy. We complement prior analytic techniques for multiple-spin coherence transfers with a systematic numerical study where we obtain strong evidence that a certain analytically motivated family of restricted controls is sufficient for time optimality. In the case of a linear three-spin system, additional evidence suggests that prior analytic pulse sequences using this family of restricted controls are time optimal even for arbitrary local controls. In addition, we compare the pulse sequences for linear Ising spin chains to pulse sequences for more realistic spin systems with additional long-range couplings between nonadjacent spins. We experimentally implement the derived pulse sequences in three- and four-spin systems and demonstrate that they are applicable in realistic settings under relaxation and experimental imperfections---in particular---by deriving broadband pulse sequences which are robust with respect to frequency offsets.