12,888 research outputs found
Shor's quantum factoring algorithm on a photonic chip
Shor's quantum factoring algorithm finds the prime factors of a large number
exponentially faster than any other known method a task that lies at the heart
of modern information security, particularly on the internet. This algorithm
requires a quantum computer a device which harnesses the `massive parallelism'
afforded by quantum superposition and entanglement of quantum bits (or qubits).
We report the demonstration of a compiled version of Shor's algorithm on an
integrated waveguide silica-on-silicon chip that guides four single-photon
qubits through the computation to factor 15.Comment: 2 pages, 1 figur
Superconductivity in Heavy Alkaline-Earths Intercalated Graphites
We report the discovery of superconductivity below 1.65(6) K in
Sr-intercalated graphite SrC6, by susceptibility and specific heat (Cp)
measurements. In comparison with CaC6, we found that the anisotropy of the
upper critical fields for SrC6 is much reduced. The Cp anomaly at Tc is smaller
than the BCS prediction indicating an anisotropic superconducting gap for SrC6
similar to CaC6. The significantly lower Tc of SrC6 as compared to CaC6 can be
understood in terms of "negative" pressure effects, which decreases the
electron-phonon coupling for both in-plane intercalant and the out-of-plane C
phonon modes. We observed no superconductivity for BaC6 down to 0.3 K.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev. Let
Swift observations of the 2006 outburst of the recurrent nova RS Ophiuchi: II. 1D hydrodynamical models of wind driven shocks
Following the early Swift X-ray observations of the latest outburst of the
recurrent nova RS Ophiuchi in February 2006 (Paper I), we present new 1D
hydrodynamical models of the system which take into account all three phases of
the remnant evolution. The models suggest a novel way of modelling the system
by treating the outburst as a sudden increase then decrease in wind mass-loss
rate and velocity. The differences between this wind model and previous
Primakoff-type simulations are described. A more complex structure, even in 1D,
is revealed through the presence of both forward and reverse shocks, with a
separating contact discontinuity. The effects of radiative cooling are
investigated and key outburst parameters such as mass-loss rate, ejecta
velocity and mass are varied. The shock velocities as a function of time are
compared to the ones derived in Paper I. We show how the manner in which the
matter is ejected controls the evolution of the shock and that for a
well-cooled remnant, the shock deceleration rate depends on the amount of
energy that is radiated away.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure
Radio Frequency Models of Novae in eruption. I. The Free-Free Process in Bipolar Morphologies
Observations of novae at radio frequencies provide us with a measure of the
total ejected mass, density profile and kinetic energy of a nova eruption. The
radio emission is typically well characterized by the free-free emission
process. Most models to date have assumed spherical symmetry for the eruption,
although it has been known for as long as there have been radio observations of
these systems, that spherical eruptions are to simplistic a geometry. In this
paper, we build bipolar models of the nova eruption, assuming the free-free
process, and show the effects of varying different parameters on the radio
light curves. The parameters considered include the ratio of the minor- to
major-axis, the inclination angle and shell thickness (further parameters are
provided in the appendix). We also show the uncertainty introduced when fitting
spherical model synthetic light curves to bipolar model synthetic light curves.
We find that the optically thick phase rises with the same power law () for both the spherical and bipolar models. In the bipolar case
there is a "plateau" phase -- depending on the thickness of the shell as well
as the ratio of the minor- to major-axis -- before the final decline, that
follows the same power law () as in the spherical case.
Finally, fitting spherical models to the bipolar model synthetic light curves
requires, in the worst case scenario, doubling the ejected mass, more than
halving the electron temperature and reducing the shell thickness by nearly a
factor of 10. This implies that in some systems we have been over predicting
the ejected masses and under predicting the electron temperature of the ejecta.Comment: 9 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in ApJ, accompanying
movie to figure 3 available at
http://www.ast.uct.ac.za/~valerio/papers/radioI
Quantum process tomography of a controlled-NOT gate
We demonstrate complete characterization of a two-qubit entangling process -
a linear optics controlled-NOT gate operating with coincident detection - by
quantum process tomography. We use maximum-likelihood estimation to convert the
experimental data into a physical process matrix. The process matrix allows
accurate prediction of the operation of the gate for arbitrary input states,
and calculation of gate performance measures such as the average gate fidelity,
average purity and entangling capability of our gate, which are 0.90, 0.83 and
0.73, respectively.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figures. v2 contains new data corresponding to improved
gate operation. Figure quality slightly reduced for arXi
Realization of a Knill-Laflamme-Milburn C-NOT gate -a photonic quantum circuit combining effective optical nonlinearities
Quantum information science addresses how uniquely quantum mechanical
phenomena such as superposition and entanglement can enhance communication,
information processing and precision measurement. Photons are appealing for
their low noise, light-speed transmission and ease of manipulation using
conventional optical components. However, the lack of highly efficient optical
Kerr nonlinearities at single photon level was a major obstacle. In a
breakthrough, Knill, Laflamme and Milburn (KLM) showed that such an efficient
nonlinearity can be achieved using only linear optical elements, auxiliary
photons, and measurement. They proposed a heralded controlled-NOT (CNOT) gate
for scalable quantum computation using a photonic quantum circuit to combine
two such nonlinear elements. Here we experimentally demonstrate a KLM CNOT
gate. We developed a stable architecture to realize the required four-photon
network of nested multiple interferometers based on a displaced-Sagnac
interferometer and several partially polarizing beamsplitters. This result
confirms the first step in the KLM `recipe' for all-optical quantum
computation, and should be useful for on-demand entanglement generation and
purification. Optical quantum circuits combining giant optical nonlinearities
may find wide applications across telecommunications and sensing.Comment: 6pages, 3figure
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