Chapman University Chapman University Digital Commons Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Science and Technology Faculty Articles and Faculty Articles and Research Research 8-23-2016 Realisation of Qudits in Coupled Potential Wells Ariel Landau Tel Aviv University Yakir Aharonov Chapman University, [email protected] Eliahu Cohen University of Bristol Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/scs_articles Part of the Quantum Physics Commons Recommended Citation Landau, A., Aharonov, Y., Cohen, E., 2016. Realization of qudits in coupled potential wells. Int. J. Quantum Inform. 14, 1650029. doi:10.1142/S0219749916500295 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Science and Technology Faculty Articles and Research at Chapman University Digital Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Mathematics, Physics, and Computer Science Faculty Articles and Research by an authorized administrator of Chapman University Digital Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Realisation of Qudits in Coupled Potential Wells Comments This is a pre-copy-editing, author-produced PDF of an article accepted for publication in International Journal of Quantum Information, volume 14, in 2016 following peer review. The definitive publisher-authenticated version is available online at DOI: 10.1142/S0219749916500295. Copyright World Scientific This article is available at Chapman University Digital Commons: http://digitalcommons.chapman.edu/scs_articles/383 Realisation of Qudits in Coupled Potential Wells Ariel Landau1, Yakir Aharonov1;2, Eliahu Cohen3 1School of Physics and Astronomy, Tel-Aviv University, Tel-Aviv 6997801, Israel 2Schmid College of Science, Chapman University, Orange, CA 92866, USA 3H.H. Wills Physics Laboratory, University of Bristol, Tyndall Avenue, Bristol, BS8 1TL, U.K PACS numbers: ABSTRACT to study the analogue 3-state register, the qutrit, and more generally the d-state qudit. Several advantages of using qutrits and qudits rather than qubits have been Quantum computation strongly relies on the realisa- discussed, e.g. in the context of improved fault-tolerance tion, manipulation and control of qubits. A central [3,4] and advantages in cryptography [5,6]. Motivated method for realizing qubits is by creating a double-well by these results we suggest a novel periodic triple-well potential system with a significant gap between the first qutrit system. On the one hand, it is based on the known two eigenvalues and the rest. In this work we first re- control and manipulation principles of the double-well visit the theoretical grounds underlying the double-well qubit, while on the other hand it presents special sym- qubit dynamics, then proceed to suggest novel extensions metries beneficial to the higher dimensional analysis of of these principles to a triple-well qutrit with periodic its evolution and control using the fundamental repre- boundary conditions, followed by a general d-well anal- sentation of SU(3). We further opt for a generalization ysis of qudits. These analyses are based on representa- of these concepts to a general dimension periodic d-well tions of the special unitary groups SU(d) which expose qudit, with a central role played by the respective repre- the systems' symmetry and employ them for performing sentation of SU(d). computations. We conclude with a few notes on coher- ence and scalability of d-well systems. The paper is organized as follows: Sec. 1 reviews the dynamics of a particle in a double-well potential while emphasizing its close relations with a spin-1/2 system. We mostly discuss in this introductory section the meth- ods for control and manipulation of the qubit state with INTRODUCTION the underlying goal of efficient execution of general trans- formations. This simple analysis will be hopefully useful in the rest of the paper which manifests its main contri- The use of quantum mechanical systems for informa- bution. Sec. 2 proposes the extension to a periodic triple- tion processing and computation has been studied ex- well qutrit system, discussing its dynamics and manipu- tensively over the last decades. Models have been well lation with regard to a set of transformations in SU(3). established for using the principles of quantum mechan- Sec. 3 aims to further extend the above ideas in a sys- ics to achieve computational advantages in the form of tem of d > 3 wells, and in particular the corresponding a speedup over classical methods, and to allow efficient evolution of a qudit in the scope of SU(d). Two dif- simulation of physical systems. However, a central chal- ferent topologies are considered for the problem: (i) a lenge on the way to fulfilling these goals continues to lie fully-connected well system featuring a highly symmet- in the realisation of such systems - how to construct a rical solution; (ii) a cyclic linearly-connected well chain, arXiv:1605.04566v2 [quant-ph] 31 Aug 2016 large-scale system, which entails the required quantum featuring a Bloch-state based solution, and essentially of properties and at the same time allows efficient manipu- higher feasibility. lations necessary for performing these tasks. Some of the main techniques for the realisation prob- lem feature the use of a double-well potential system to store and manipulate the qubit. Realisations of a double- well-based qubit have been demonstrated using supercon- ducting circuits (SQUID), which provide efficient control over the qubit transformations and feasible integration with electronic circuitry [1,2]. As an alternative to the qubit, work has been done 2 1. REVISITING THE DOUBLE-WELL projections on the left and right wells, and take initial POTENTIAL conditions of jΨ(t = 0)i = jLi for example, the right-well probability amplitude PR = hRjΨi then oscillates: dP ν Review of States and Dynamics R = sin(!t); (5) dt ~ with a frequency The double-well potential system is a widely consid- ∆E ered tool for producing a 2-level system, due to its energy ! = 01 : (6) separation featuring a pair of lower states well-separated ~ from the rest of the spectrum: In general we use the following criteria to define a double-well system, in either one or higher dimensions: ∆E01 ∆E12: (1) 1. Parity symmetry: the two wells are identical under a discrete symmetry denoted by P , e.g. reflection Eq.1 can be derived by solving the Schr¨odinger about x = 0 for a 1D well PV (x) = V (−x) or about equation for the specific double-well potential form. A a center plane in 3D, PV (x; y; z) = V (x; y; −z)[49]. solution for the simple square-well case is summarized The commutation relation is therefore satisfied: in Appendix A and further detailed in [7]. [H; P ] = 0: (7) The energy gap ∆E01 is related to the tunneling am- 2. The coupling between the two wells is weak enough, plitude, denoted by ν. As denoted for example in [8], this i.e. the barrier is high enough, so that Eq.1 ap- tunneling amplitude can be related to the wavefunction plies. using the WKB approximation These criteria suffice to produce a symmetric and anti- symmetric pair of lower states, j0i and j1i, which serve 2 ~ d s as a 2-level system in the low-energy regime (with am- ν = s ; (2) m dx x=0 plitudes for higher levels negligible, hkjΨi ≈ 0 ; k ≥ 2). where s is the localized wavefunction in the right or left well. The solution can generally be written as [9] ! 2-level operators 2 Z a=2 ν = C · exp − dxp2m(V (x) − E) ; (3) ~ −a=2 for a barrier of width a around the origin[48]. For exam- Setting a reference basis of right and left projections, ple, in the square potential (see Appendix A) we obtain we may write a general two-state symmetric Hamiltonian for ν [9], for the system: 0 1 H = −νσ = −ν ; (8) 2;s x 1 0 p 2~E 2m(V0 − E) 2ap ν = exp − 2m(V0 − E) : (4) with ν the tunneling amplitude (Eq.3), and the basis mV0L ~ vectors 1 0 j "i = ; j #i = (9) The proportion between ν and ∆E01 can be simply 0 1 found in a two-state system analysis, performed in the next section. are localized states in the right/left well, namely jRi; jLi. Solving the time-dependent Schr¨odingerequation, it is apparent that the tunneling implies oscillatory dynam- The Hamiltonian's invariance to a ",# swap manifests ics of the 2-level state. Shall we define jLi and jRi as the parity symmetry defined in Eq.7. Solving for the 3 ∗ energy eigenstates relates the tunneling amplitude with ~ ∗ dΨ dΨ where j(x) = 2mi Ψ dx − Ψ dx , while using the con- the energy gap: tinuity equation in the rightmost equality. E0;1 = ±ν ) ∆E01 = 2ν: (10) The relation of energy, current and position to the qubit operators σx, σy, σz provides physical meaning to Thus, remaining in the low energy regime with signif- the different qubit transformations, explicitly connecting icant amplitudes held only for the states j0i; j1i, we may each one with a corresponding observable. treat the system as equivalent to a spin-1/2 particle, un- 1 der the generating group 2 σi with σi being the Pauli matrices: Dynamics and manipulation 0 1 0 −i 1 0 σ = ; σ = ; σ = : (11) x 1 0 y i 0 z 0 −1 With the Hamiltonian H2;s, the time evolution of the double-well qubit corresponds to precession about the x- The eigenvectors of the simplified Hamiltonian H2;s are axis, equivalent to a spin-1/2 particle in a magnetic field the σx eigenstates: Bx^. 1 1 j0i = p1 = j+i; j1i = p1 = |−i: (12) 2 1 2 −1 In general, the evolution of a state j i = αj0i + βj1i is: i i i Satisfying the P symmetry, the energy states j0i; j1i are − Ht − E0t − E1t j (t)i = e ~ j (0)i = e ~ αj0i + e ~ βj1i symmetric and antisymmetric, respectively, in context i − E0t −i!t of the P operator.