Decoherence in a Josephson junction qubit

The zero-voltage state of a Josephson junction biased with constant current consists of a set of metastable quantum energy levels. We probe the spacings of these levels by using microwave spectroscopy to enhance the escape rate to the voltage state. The widths of the resonances give a measurement of the coherence time of the two states involved in the transitions. We observe a decoherence time shorter than that expected from dissipation alone in resonantly isolated 20 um x 5 um Al/AlOx/Al junctions at 60 mK. The data is well fit by a model including dephasing effects of both low-frequency current noise and the escape rate to the continuum voltage states. We discuss implications for quantum computation using current-biased Josephson junction qubits, including the minimum number of levels needed in the well to obtain an acceptable error limit per gate.Comment: 4 pages, 6 figure

Josephson-phase qubit without tunneling

We show that a complete set of one-bit gates can be realized by coupling the two logical states of a phase qubit to a third level (at higher energy) using microwave pulses. Thus, one can achieve coherent control without invoking any tunneling between the qubit levels. We propose two implementations, using rf-SQUIDs and d-wave Josephson junctions.Comment: REVTeX4, 4pp., 6 EPS figure files; N.B.: "Alec" is my first, and "Maassen van den Brink" my family name. v2: gate universality fleshed out, small fix in d-wave decoherence para, discussion expanded, two Refs. added. v3: some more Refs., a molecular example, and a few minor fixes; final, to appear in PRB Rapid

Universal Quantum Computation using Exchange Interactions and Teleportation of Single-Qubit Operations

We show how to construct a universal set of quantum logic gates using control over exchange interactions and single- and two-spin measurements only. Single-spin unitary operations are teleported instead of being executed directly, thus eliminating a major difficulty in the construction of several of the most promising proposals for solid-state quantum computation, such as spin-coupled quantum dots, donor-atom nuclear spins in silicon, and electrons on helium. Contrary to previous proposals dealing with this difficulty, our scheme requires no encoding redundancy. We also discuss an application to superconducting phase qubits.Comment: 4.5 pages, including 2 figure

Tunable resonators for quantum circuits

We have designed, fabricated and measured high-Q $\lambda/2$ coplanar waveguide microwave resonators whose resonance frequency is made tunable with magnetic field by inserting a DC-SQUID array (including 1 or 7 SQUIDs) inside. Their tunability range is 30% of the zero field frequency. Their quality factor reaches up to 3$\times10^4$. We present a model based on thermal fluctuations that accounts for the dependance of the quality factor with magnetic field.Comment: subm. to JLTP (Proc. of LTD12 conference

Quantum information processing with superconducting qubits in a microwave field

We investigate the quantum dynamics of a Cooper-pair box with a superconducting loop in the presence of a nonclassical microwave field. We demonstrate the existence of Rabi oscillations for both single- and multi-photon processes and, moreover, we propose a new quantum computing scheme (including one-bit and conditional two-bit gates) based on Josephson qubits coupled through microwaves.Comment: 7 pages, 1 figur

Communicating Josephson Qubits

We propose a scheme to implement a quantum information transfer protocol with a superconducting circuit and Josephson charge qubits. The information exchange is mediated by an L-C resonator used as a data bus. The main decoherence sources are analyzed in detail.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure

Life after charge noise: recent results with transmon qubits

We review the main theoretical and experimental results for the transmon, a superconducting charge qubit derived from the Cooper pair box. The increased ratio of the Josephson to charging energy results in an exponential suppression of the transmon's sensitivity to 1/f charge noise. This has been observed experimentally and yields homogeneous broadening, negligible pure dephasing, and long coherence times of up to 3 microseconds. Anharmonicity of the energy spectrum is required for qubit operation, and has been proven to be sufficient in transmon devices. Transmons have been implemented in a wide array of experiments, demonstrating consistent and reproducible results in very good agreement with theory.Comment: 6 pages, 4 figures. Review article, accepted for publication in Quantum Inf. Pro

The Renormalization Effects in the Microstrip-SQUID Amplifier

The peculiarities of the microstrip-DC SQUID amplifier caused by the resonant structure of the input circuit are analyzed. It is shown that the mutual inductance, that couples the input circuit and the SQUID loop, depends on the frequency of electromagnetic field. The renormalization of the SQUID parameters due to the screening effect of the input circuit vanishes when the Josephson frequency is much greater than the signal frequency.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figure

Inflation, cold dark matter, and the central density problem

A problem with high central densities in dark halos has arisen in the context of LCDM cosmologies with scale-invariant initial power spectra. Although n=1 is often justified by appealing to the inflation scenario, inflationary models with mild deviations from scale-invariance are not uncommon and models with significant running of the spectral index are plausible. Even mild deviations from scale-invariance can be important because halo collapse times and densities depend on the relative amount of small-scale power. We choose several popular models of inflation and work out the ramifications for galaxy central densities. For each model, we calculate its COBE-normalized power spectrum and deduce the implied halo densities using a semi-analytic method calibrated against N-body simulations. We compare our predictions to a sample of dark matter-dominated galaxies using a non-parametric measure of the density. While standard n=1, LCDM halos are overdense by a factor of 6, several of our example inflation+CDM models predict halo densities well within the range preferred by observations. We also show how the presence of massive (0.5 eV) neutrinos may help to alleviate the central density problem even with n=1. We conclude that galaxy central densities may not be as problematic for the CDM paradigm as is sometimes assumed: rather than telling us something about the nature of the dark matter, galaxy rotation curves may be telling us something about inflation and/or neutrinos. An important test of this idea will be an eventual consensus on the value of sigma_8, the rms overdensity on the scale 8 h^-1 Mpc. Our successful models have values of sigma_8 approximately 0.75, which is within the range of recent determinations. Finally, models with n>1 (or sigma_8 > 1) are highly disfavored.Comment: 13 pages, 6 figures. Minor changes made to reflect referee's Comments, error in Eq. (18) corrected, references updated and corrected, conclusions unchanged. Version accepted for publication in Phys. Rev. D, scheduled for 15 August 200

Rock snot and lake mud: exploring the history of recent blooms of didymosphenia geminata using information contained in lake sediments

Ecosystem managers have often considered the nuisance diatom species, Didymosphenia gemi¬nata (didymo) as being introduced to the natural environment through human activities; however, observations from early 20th-century surveys challenge this characterization. We use diatoms pre¬served in lake sediment cores to investigate the history of didymo blooms from Gaspésie, Quebec. Relative abundances of diatoms were examined from the dated sediments of Lac Humqui and Lac au Saumon (a lake with an inflowing river currently supporting blooms). Didymo was observed throughout the Lac au Saumon core, demonstrating that it has been present in the region well before the first reports of blooms in 2006. Lac Humqui diatom assemblages experienced a shift in composition with declines in benthic taxa (attached to substrates) and increases in planktonic (free floating) diatoms that began ~1970. Strong relationships between this diatom shift, and increases in regional air temperatures and earlier river ice-out dates were consistent with the expected effects of climate warming on aquatic systems. Our paleolimnological evidence shows that climate warming, rather than human introduction, likely plays an important role in triggering didymo blooms