Communications of the ACM
Combining Quantum Information Communication and Storage
An artist's representation of a superconducting quantum bit, or qubit, which Aalto University researchers have successfully combined with a micrometer-sized drum head, creating the potential for information storage.
Credit: Aalto University
Aalto University researchers have connected a superconducting qubit with a micrometer-sized drum head, transferring information from the qubit to the resonator and back again. Their work represents the first step toward creating exotic mechanical quantum states.
The technique involves storing the qubit as vibration, thus preserving the state for much longer than the qubit itself. The transfer makes it possible to produce a state in which the resonator concurrently vibrates and does not vibrate, notes Aalto professor Mika Sillanpaa. The resonator also serves as a mechanical quantum memory, which is something that an ordinary memory cannot do, says Aalto doctoral student Juha Pirkkalainen.
Their work integrates research by Nobel Prize winners Serge Haroche and David Wineland to respectively measure the qubit state using a superconducting cavity and link the state to mechanical movement.
The Aalto researchers' experiment was prepared for a tiny silicon microchip, which made it possible to cool the sample to near absolute zero temperatures and then use microwaves to heat it back up again.
From Aalto University
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Abstracts Copyright © 2013 Information Inc., Bethesda, Maryland, USA
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