Spin-based Quantum Information Processing Research Articles

Effect of a Phonon Bottleneck on Exciton and Spin Generation in Self-Assembled In1−xGaxAs Quantum Dots

Semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) hold great potential for solid-state light-emitting devices and optical and spin-based quantum information processing, but the efficiency of QD-based spin LEDs remains limited, and their physics not fully understood. Using tunable laser spectroscopy, the authors discover that here an intrinsic obstacle to spin generation is $p\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}h\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}o\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}n\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}o\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}n$ $b\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}o\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}t\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}t\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}l\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}e\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}n\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}e\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}c\phantom{\rule{0}{0ex}}k$, a lack of phonon-mediated relaxation pathways that can arise in a zero-dimensional system. This insight provides design rules for energy-level engineering in spin-optoelectronic applications of QDs, yielding about a threefold increase in spin generation efficiency, even at elevated temperatures.

Strain-Induced Spin-Resonance Shifts in Silicon Devices

In spin-based quantum information processing devices, the presence of control and detection circuitry can change the local environment of a spin by introducing strain and electric fields, altering its resonant frequencies. These resonance shifts can be large compared to intrinsic spin line-widths and it is therefore important to study, understand and model such effects in order to better predict device performance. Here we investigate a sample of bismuth donor spins implanted in a silicon chip, on top of which a superconducting aluminium micro-resonator has been fabricated. The on-chip resonator provides two functions: first, it produces local strain in the silicon due to the larger thermal contraction of the aluminium, and second, it enables sensitive electron spin resonance spectroscopy of donors close to the surface that experience this strain. Through finite-element strain simulations we are able to reconstruct key features of our experiments, including the electron spin resonance spectra. Our results are consistent with a recently discovered mechanism for producing shifts of the hyperfine interaction for donors in silicon, which is linear with the hydrostatic component of an applied strain.

Controlled spatial separation of spins and coherent dynamics in spin-orbit-coupled nanostructures

The spatial separation of electron spins followed by the control of their individual spin dynamics has recently emerged as an essential ingredient in many proposals for spin-based technologies because it would enable both of the two spin species to be simultaneously utilized, distinct from most of the current spintronic studies and technologies wherein only one spin species could be handled at a time. Here we demonstrate that the spatial spin splitting of a coherent beam of electrons can be achieved and controlled using the interplay between an external magnetic field and Rashba spin–orbit interaction in semiconductor nanostructures. The technique of transverse magnetic focusing is used to detect this spin separation. More notably, our ability to engineer the spin–orbit interactions enables us to simultaneously manipulate and probe the coherent spin dynamics of both spin species and hence their correlation, which could open a route towards spintronics and spin-based quantum information processing.

Manipulation of dynamic nuclear spin polarization in single quantum dots by photonic environment engineering

Optically induced dynamic nuclear spin polarization (DNP) in a semiconductor quantum dot (QD) requires many cycles of excitation of spin polarized carriers and carrier recombination. As such, the radiative lifetime of the exciton containing the electron becomes one of the limiting factors of DNP. In principle, changing the radiative lifetime of the exciton will affect DNP and thus the nuclear spin polarization. Here, we demonstrate the manipulation of DNP in single QDs through the engineering of the photonic environment using two-dimensional photonic crystals. We find that the achievable degree of nuclear spin polarization can be controlled through the modification of exciton radiative lifetime. Our results show the promise of achieving a higher degree of nuclear spin polarization via photonic environment engineering, with implications on spin-based quantum information processing.

Fast spin information transfer between distant quantum dots using individual electrons.

Transporting ensembles of electrons over long distances without losing their spin polarization is an important benchmark for spintronic devices. It usually requires injecting and probing spin-polarized electrons in conduction channels using ferromagnetic contacts or optical excitation. In parallel with this development, important efforts have been dedicated to achieving control of nanocircuits at the single-electron level. The detection and coherent manipulation of the spin of a single electron trapped in a quantum dot are now well established. Combined with the recently demonstrated control of the displacement of individual electrons between two distant quantum dots, these achievements allow the possibility of realizing spintronic protocols at the single-electron level. Here, we demonstrate that spin information carried by one or two electrons can be transferred between two quantum dots separated by a distance of 4 μm with a classical fidelity of 65%. We show that at present it is limited by spin flips occurring during the transfer procedure before and after electron displacement. Being able to encode and control information in the spin degree of freedom of a single electron while it is being transferred over distances of a few micrometres on nanosecond timescales will pave the way towards 'quantum spintronics' devices, which could be used to implement large-scale spin-based quantum information processing.

Initialization of a spin qubit in a site-controlled nanowire quantum dot

A fault-tolerant quantum repeater or quantum computer using solid-state spin-based quantum bits will likely require a physical implementation with many spins arranged in a grid. Self-assembled quantum dots (QDs) have been established as attractive candidates for building spin-based quantum information processing devices, but such QDs are randomly positioned, which makes them unsuitable for constructing large-scale processors. Recent efforts have shown that QDs embedded in nanowires can be deterministically positioned in regular arrays, can store single charges, and have excellent optical properties, but so far there have been no demonstrations of spin qubit operations using nanowire QDs. Here we demonstrate optical pumping of individual spins trapped in site-controlled nanowire QDs, resulting in high-fidelity spin-qubit initialization. This represents the next step towards establishing spins in nanowire QDs as quantum memories suitable for use in a large-scale, fault-tolerant quantum computer or repeater based on all-optical control of the spin qubits.

Doppler effect induced spin relaxation boom.

We study an electron spin qubit confined in a moving quantum dot (QD), with our attention on both spin relaxation, and the product of spin relaxation, the emitted phonons. We find that Doppler effect leads to several interesting phenomena. In particular, spin relaxation rate peaks when the QD motion is in the transonic regime, which we term a spin relaxation boom in analogy to the classical sonic boom. This peak indicates that a moving spin qubit may have even lower relaxation rate than a static qubit, pointing at the possibility of coherence-preserving transport for a spin qubit. We also find that the emitted phonons become strongly directional and narrow in their frequency range as the qubit reaches the supersonic regime, similar to Cherenkov radiation. In other words, fast moving excited spin qubits can act as a source of non-classical phonons. Compared to classical Cherenkov radiation, we show that quantum dot confinement produces a small but important correction on the Cherenkov angle. Taking together, these results have important implications to both spin-based quantum information processing and coherent phonon dynamics in semiconductor nanostructures.

Observation of coupling between zero- and two-dimensional semiconductor systems based on anomalous diamagnetic effects

We report the direct observation of coupling between a single self-assembled InAs quantum dot and a wetting layer, based on strong diamagnetic shifts of many-body exciton states using magneto-photoluminescence spectroscopy. An extremely large positive diamagnetic coefficient is observed when an electron in the wetting layer combines with a hole in the quantum dot; the coefficient is nearly one order of magnitude larger than that of the exciton states confined in the quantum dots. Recombination of electrons with holes in a quantum dot of the coupled system leads to an unusual negative diamagnetic effect, which is five times stronger than that in a pure quantum dot system. This effect can be attributed to the expansion of the wavefunction of remaining electrons in the wetting layer or the spread of electrons in the excited states of the quantum dot to the wetting layer after recombination. In this case, the wavefunction extent of the final states in the quantum dot plane is much larger than that of the initial states because of the absence of holes in the quantum dot to attract electrons. The properties of emitted photons that depend on the large electron wavefunction extents in the wetting layer indicate that the coupling occurs between systems of different dimensionality, which is also verified from the results obtained by applying a magnetic field in different configurations. This study paves a new way to observe hybrid states with zero- and two-dimensional structures, which could be useful for investigating the Kondo physics and implementing spin-based solid-state quantum information processing.

Electron-Hole Confinement Symmetry in Silicon Quantum Dots.

We report electrical transport measurements on a gate-defined ambipolar quantum dot in intrinsic silicon. The ambipolarity allows its operation as either an electron or a hole quantum dot of which we change the dot occupancy by 20 charge carriers in each regime. Electron-hole confinement symmetry is evidenced by the extracted gate capacitances and charging energies. The results demonstrate that ambipolar quantum dots offer great potential for spin-based quantum information processing, since confined electrons and holes can be compared and manipulated in the same crystalline environment.

Robust micromagnet design for fast electrical manipulations of single spins in quantum dots

Tailoring spin coupling to electric fields is central to spintronics and spin-based quantum information processing. We present an optimal micromagnet design that produces appropriate stray magnetic fields to mediate fast electrical spin manipulations in nanodevices. We quantify the practical requirements for spatial field inhomogeneity and tolerance for misalignment with spins, and propose a design scheme to improve the spin-rotation frequency (to exceed 50 MHz in GaAs nanostructures). We then validate our design by experiments in separate devices. Our results will open a route to rapidly control solid-state electron spins with limited lifetimes and to study coherent spin dynamics in solids.

Single-charge transport in ambipolar silicon nanoscale field-effect transistors

We report single-charge transport in ambipolar nanoscale MOSFETs, electrostatically defined in near-intrinsic silicon. We use the ambipolarity to demonstrate the confinement of either a few electrons or a few holes in exactly the same crystalline environment underneath a gate electrode. We find similar electron and hole quantum dot properties while the mobilities differ quantitatively like in microscale devices. The understanding and control of individual electrons and holes are essential for spin-based quantum information processing.

ESR Studies of N@C60 and Its Derivatives in Polymer Matrices: Advances and Challenges

The paramagnetic endohedral fullerene molecule N@C60 is a candidate as an electron spin based quantum information processing element due to its exceedingly long phase coherence lifetime. A lot of attention has been focused on the electron spin properties of N@C60 in different environments. In terms of synthetic chemistry, a significant milestone has been the synthesis of a dimer molecule covalently linking two N@C60 units. The next significant challenge is the ability to control the interaction between multiple spin centres in an array. One potential method to achieve this is to macroscopically align rigid multi spin centre N@C60 molecules by incorporating them into a polymer matrix that is subsequently uniaxially drawn to align the chains. In this talk, I will present our ESR studies of the environment of pristine N@C60 and an N@C60-C60 dimer molecule in polystyrene matrices. I will show that deuteration of the polymer has a marked positive effect on the phase memory coherence time of pristine N@C60. Furthermore, I will show that deuterated polystyrene acts as a suitable polymer matrix for rigid N@C60-C60 dimer molecules, permitting both uniform dispersion and retention of a phase memory time (T m) of 21µs at 40 K. This timescale is long enough to allow thousands of pulsed sequences to take place in order to manipulate the individual spin centres before decoherence can occur.

A scheme for tunable magnon laser based on a hybrid quantum dot-ferromagnetic waveguide system

We have theoretically demonstrated the generation of coherent magnons with the help of a microwave pump field in a hybrid semiconductor quantum dot-ferromagnetic waveguide system. It is shown that this coherent amplification will occur due to the quantum dot-magnon coupling via a strong pump beam. The intensity of the magnon laser could be drastically enhanced by increasing the intensity of the pump beam. The scheme proposed here will have its potential applications in spin-based devices and quantum information processing.

High-fidelity readout and control of a nuclear spin qubit in silicon

Detection of nuclear spin precession is critical for a wide range of scientific techniques that have applications in diverse fields including analytical chemistry, materials science, medicine and biology. Fundamentally, it is possible because of the extreme isolation of nuclear spins from their environment. This isolation also makes single nuclear spins desirable for quantum-information processing, as shown by pioneering studies on nitrogen-vacancy centres in diamond. The nuclear spin of a (31)P donor in silicon is very promising as a quantum bit: bulk measurements indicate that it has excellent coherence times and silicon is the dominant material in the microelectronics industry. Here we demonstrate electrical detection and coherent manipulation of a single (31)P nuclear spin qubit with sufficiently high fidelities for fault-tolerant quantum computing. By integrating single-shot readout of the electron spin with on-chip electron spin resonance, we demonstrate quantum non-demolition and electrical single-shot readout of the nuclear spin with a readout fidelity higher than 99.8 percent-the highest so far reported for any solid-state qubit. The single nuclear spin is then operated as a qubit by applying coherent radio-frequency pulses. For an ionized (31)P donor, we find a nuclear spin coherence time of 60 milliseconds and a one-qubit gate control fidelity exceeding 98 percent. These results demonstrate that the dominant technology of modern electronics can be adapted to host a complete electrical measurement and control platform for nuclear-spin-based quantum-information processing.

Microwave probe for intrinsic parameters in a hybrid spin-nanoresonator system

Hybrid spin-mechanical systems are at present being actively explored for potential quantum-computing applications. In combination with the pump-probe techniques, we theoretically propose a scheme to measure the resonator frequency and coupling strength in a hybrid spin-mechanical resonator system which has a strong coherent coupling of an electronic spin of a single nitrogen vacancy center in diamond with a nanomechanical resonator. The probe absorption spectrum which exhibits new features such as mechanically induced three-photon resonance and ac Stark effect is obtained. Simultaneously, the coherent coupling strength between the quantized motion of a mechanical resonator and an isolated spin can also be detected from Rabi-splitting like peak in the probe spectrum. The microwave probe technique presented here will offer potential applications in spin-based quantum devices and quantum information processing.

Three-dimensional optical manipulation of a single electron spin

Nitrogen vacancy (NV) centres in diamond are promising elemental blocks for quantum optics, spin-based quantum information processing and high-resolution sensing. However, fully exploiting the capabilities of these NV centres requires suitable strategies to accurately manipulate them. Here, we use optical tweezers as a tool to achieve deterministic trapping and three-dimensional spatial manipulation of individual nanodiamonds hosting a single NV spin. Remarkably, we find that the NV axis is nearly fixed inside the trap and can be controlled in situ by adjusting the polarization of the trapping light. By combining this unique spatial and angular control with coherent manipulation of the NV spin and fluorescence lifetime measurements near an integrated photonic system, we demonstrate individual optically trapped NV centres as a novel route for both three-dimensional vectorial magnetometry and sensing of the local density of optical states.

Nanoscale broadband transmission lines for spin qubit control

The intense interest in spin-based quantum information processing has caused an increasing overlap between the two traditionally distinct disciplines of magnetic resonance and nanotechnology. In this work we discuss rigorous design guidelines to integrate microwave circuits with charge-sensitive nanostructures, and describe how to simulate such structures accurately and efficiently. We present a new design for an on-chip, broadband, nanoscale microwave line that optimizes the magnetic field used to drive a spin-based quantum bit (or qubit) while minimizing the disturbance to a nearby charge sensor. This new structure was successfully employed in a single-spin qubit experiment, and shows that the simulations accurately predict the magnetic field values even at frequencies as high as 30 GHz.

Spin-based Optomechanics with Carbon Nanotubes

A simple scheme for determination of spin-orbit coupling strength in spinbased optomechanics with carbon nanotubes is introduced, under the control of a strong pump field and a weak signal field. The physical mechanism comes from the phonon induced transparency (PIT), by relying on the coherent coupling of electron spin to vibrational motion of the nanotube, which is analogous to electromagnetically induced transparency (EIT) effect in atom systems. Based on this spin-nanotube optomechanical system, we also conceptually design a single photon router and a quantum microwave transistor, with ultralow pump power (~ pW) and tunable switching time, which should provide a unique platform for the study of spin-based microwave quantum optics and quantum information processing.

Resonant Addressing and Manipulation of Silicon Vacancy Qubits in Silicon Carbide

Several systems in the solid state have been suggested as promising candidates for spin-based quantum information processing. In spite of significant progress during the last decade, there is a search for new systems with higher potential [D. DiVincenzo, Nat. Mater. 9, 468 (2010)]. We report that silicon vacancy defects in silicon carbide comprise the technological advantages of semiconductor quantum dots and the unique spin properties of the nitrogen-vacancy defects in diamond. Similar to atoms, the silicon vacancy qubits can be controlled under the double radio-optical resonance conditions, allowing for their selective addressing and manipulation. Furthermore, we reveal their long spin memory using pulsed magnetic resonance technique. All these results make silicon vacancy defects in silicon carbide very attractive for quantum applications.

Fast and Robust Spin Manipulation in a Quantum Dot by Electric Fields

We apply an invariant-based inverse engineering method to control, by time-dependent electric fields, the spin dynamics in a quantum dot with spin-orbit coupling in a weak magnetic field. The designed electric fields provide a shortcut to adiabatic processes that flip the spin rapidly, thus avoiding decoherence effects. This approach, being robust with respect to the device-dependent noise, can open new possibilities for spin-based quantum information processing.