Demonstration of pure geometric universal single-qubit operation on two-level atoms

Abstract

With carefully prepared resonant laser-controlled pulses, the two quantum states of a cold ensemble of sodium atoms were manipulated by pure geometric rotations of the Bloch vector around axes 2 and 3 on the Bloch sphere. The fidelity for two geometric rotations was improved to be 90%. A universal single-qubit operation on the ground-state wave function was demonstrated by a pure geometric operation and the phase shift due to the rotation around axis 3 was measured using a geometric atom interferometer.