Experimental progress of quantum computation based on trapped single neutral atoms

Abstract

As an important candidate for quantum simulation and quantum computation, a microscopic array of single atoms confined in optical dipole traps is advantageous in controlled interaction, long coherence time, and scalability of providing thousands of qubits in a small footprint of less than 1 mm². Recently, several breakthroughs have greatly advanced the applications of neutral atom system in quantum simulation and quantum computation, such as atom-by-atom assembling of defect-free arbitrary atomic arrays, single qubit addressing and manipulating in two-dimensional and three-dimensional arrays, extending coherence time of atomic qubits, controlled-NOT (C-NOT) gate based on Rydberg interactions, high fidelity readout, etc.In this paper, the experimental progress of quantum computation based on trapped single neutral atoms is reviewed, along with two contributions done by single atom group in Wuhan Institute of Physics and Mathematics of Chinese Academy of Sciences. First, a magic-intensity trapping technique is developed and used to mitigate the detrimental decoherence effects which are induced by light shift and substantially enhance the coherence time to 225 ms which is 100 times as large as our previous coherence time thus amplifying the ratio between coherence time and single qubit operation time to 10⁵. Second, the difference in resonant frequency between the two atoms of different isotopes is used to avoid crosstalking between individually addressing and manipulating nearby atoms. Based on this heteronuclear single atom system, the heteronuclear C-NOT quantum gate and entanglement of an Rb-85 atom and an Rb-87 atom are demonstrated via Rydberg blockade for the first time. These results will trigger the quests for new protocols and schemes to use the double species for quantum computation with neutral atoms. In the end, the challenge and outlook for further developing the neutral atom system in quantum simulation and quantum computation are also reviewed.