One-way quantum computation proceeds by sequentially measuring individual
spins (qubits) in an entangled many-spin resource state. It remains a
challenge, however, to efficiently produce such resource states. Is it possible
to reduce the task of generating these states to simply cooling a quantum
many-body system to its ground state? Cluster states, the canonical resource
for one-way quantum computing, do not naturally occur as ground states of
physical systems. This led to a significant effort to identify alternative
resource states that appear as ground states in spin lattices. An appealing
candidate is a valence-bond-solid state described by Affleck, Kennedy, Lieb,
and Tasaki (AKLT). It is the unique, gapped ground state for a two-body
Hamiltonian on a spin-1 chain, and can be used as a resource for one-way
quantum computing. Here, we experimentally generate a photonic AKLT state and
use it to implement single-qubit quantum logic gates.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figures, 8 tables - added one referenc
