STAGE Protection and Operation of Quantum Information in a Mechanical--Superconducting Circuit coupled quantum experiment

Groups: Quantic lab @ Inria Paris; LKB @ Sorbonne Université.
Supervisors: Alain Sarlette (Inria Paris); Samuel Deléglise (LKB)

Details:
In the framework of the ANR project "MecaFlux", we are developing a hybrid quantum platform, coupling mechanical oscillators with superconducting circuits. Mechanical oscillators have a very long characteristic lifetime as such, but their low frequency makes them too sensitive such that it is difficult to control them in their lowest-energy states. Superconducting circuits in turn are now very well controllable in the quantum regime, and it is the technology used by big companies (Google, IBM, AWS,...) towards building their first "noisy intermediate-scale" quantum computers (NISQ). The bare qubit lifetime of such devices is much more limited as electrical signals are much harder to isolate from their environment. This implies serious error-correction overheads in terms of system size and operations, if we want to scale up beyond NISQ. The MecaFlux project aims at extracting the benefits of both platforms as a new building block for quantum technologies.
The purpose of this internship is to develop control strategies to be applied to this hybrid system for which we are getting the first experimental results. Depending on the candidate's expertise and preference, a first approach can be selected among optimal control operations, information protection strategies, including reservoir engineering or other quantum control schemes.