Quantum Information

Based on the joint work with Sergey Bravyi, IBM Watson.   We show that any topologically ordered local stabilizer model of spins in three dimensional lattices that lacks string logical operators can be used as a reliable quantum memory against thermal noise. It is shown that any local process creating a topologically charged particle separated from other particles by distance $R$, must cross an energy barrier of height $c \log R$. This property makes the model glassy. We devise an efficient decoding algorithm that should be used at the final read-out, and prove a lower bound on the memory time until which the fidelity between the outcome of the decoder and the initial state is close to 1. The memory time increases as $L^{\beta}$ where $L$ is the system size and $\beta$ the inverse temperature, as long as $L < L^\star \sim e^\beta$. Hence, the optimal memory time scales as $e^{\beta^2}$. Our bound applies when the system interacts with thermal bath via a Markovian master equation. We give an example of 3D local stabilizer codes that satisfies all of our assumptions. We numerically verify for this example that our bound is tight up to constants.

In this talk, I will briefly review the recent progress on quantum computation and simulation in the trapped ion system, with particular emphasis on the idea of scaling (how to scale up the number of qubits). I will discuss ideas towards large-scale quantum computation/simulation based on the network approach or the use of transverse phonon modes in anharmonic traps and then review the recent experimental progress along this direction.  At the end of the talk, I will also briefly mention recent activities in Tsinghua-Michigan Joint Institute for quantum information.