Can optical light entangle distant superconducting qubits?
Can distant superconducting qubits be entangled using light fields? This question lies at the heart of one strategy to construct a quantum communication network. Superconducting qubits systems are making steady progress towards the distant goal of building a general-purpose and fault-tolerant quantum information processing machine. Networking these future quantum computers together would permit entanglement to exist indefinitely in states shared between several independent parties separated by many kilometers. The non-classical correlations encoded in such a state are a completely new kind of resource in communications systems. But to entangle these future quantum computers with each other requires that we overcome a deep incompatibility between superconducting qubits and light, which can carry quantum information over long-distances. My talk will describe a strategy that pursues mechanical or acoustical oscillators as a medium to noiselessly exchange quantum states between the electrical domain of superconducting qubits and laser light. I’ll describe what is favorable about this approach and show recent progress in implementing it.
Livestream the talk on Zoom (Yale login required)