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Quantum control of a spin qubit coupled to a photonic crystal cavity

Nature Photonics volume 7, pages 329–334 (2013)Cite this article

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Abstract

A key ingredient for a quantum network is an interface between stationary quantum bits and photons, which act as flying qubits for interactions and communication. Photonic crystal architectures are promising platforms for enhancing the coupling of light to solid-state qubits. Quantum dots can be integrated into a photonic crystal, with optical transitions coupling to photons and spin states forming a long-lived quantum memory. Many researchers have now succeeded in coupling these emitters to photonic crystal cavities, but there have been no demonstrations of a functional spin qubit and quantum gates in this environment. Here, we have developed a coupled cavity–quantum dot system in which the dot is controllably charged with a single electron. We perform the initialization, rotation and measurement of a single electron spin qubit using laser pulses, and find that the cavity can significantly improve these processes.

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Figure 1: Charged quantum dots in a cavity.
Figure 2: Resonant laser spectroscopy.
Figure 3: Spin initialization and measurement in QD-C2.
Figure 4: Coherent spin rotation.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by a Multi-University Research Initiative (US Army Research Office; W911NF0910406), the NSA/LPS, and the US Office of Naval Research. The authors thank A. Greilich for contributions during the preliminary stage of this research.

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Author notes

  1. Samuel G. Carter and Timothy M. Sweeney: These authors contributed equally to this work

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, 20375, District of Columbia, USA

    Samuel G. Carter, Chul Soo Kim, Sophia E. Economou, Thomas L. Reinecke, Allan S. Bracker & Daniel Gammon

  2. NRC Postdoctoral Associate Residing at the Naval Research Laboratory, Washington, 20375, District of Columbia, USA

    Timothy M. Sweeney, Dmitry Solenov & Lily Yang

  3. Sotera Defense Solutions, Inc, Annapolis Junction, 20701, Maryland, USA

    Mijin Kim

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  1. Samuel G. Carter
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Contributions

All authors were involved in preparing the manuscript. S.G.C., T.M.S., A.S.B. and D.G. conceived and designed the experiments and samples. A.S.B. grew the quantum dot samples. M.K., C.S.K. and A.S.B. processed photonic crystals and gates in the samples. T.M.S., S.G.C. and L.Y. optically characterized the cavities and quantum dots. S.G.C. performed the differential reflectivity and laser control experiments. D.S., S.E.E., T.L.R. and T.M.S. provided theoretical insight and calculations.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Daniel Gammon.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Carter, S., Sweeney, T., Kim, M. et al. Quantum control of a spin qubit coupled to a photonic crystal cavity. Nature Photon 7, 329–334 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2013.41

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