Swap Gate

Photonic quantum computing has long struggled with the basic lack of photon interaction, despite its potential benefits of minimal decoherence and ease of manipulation. Due to this absence of direct interaction, generating entangled photonic states for quantum processing is difficult and sometimes needs poor probabilistic methods.

Quantum Source and the Weizmann Institute recently developed a breakthrough design that leverages a single atom as a “computational gatekeeper” to provide high-fidelity photon-atom gates for deterministic entanglement and photon synthesis.

This innovative paradigm solves photonic quantum computing’s main obstacle by replacing probabilistic photon interactions with atom-mediated, deterministic operations. This idea uses a rubidium-87 atom coupled to an optical resonator to create a multigate quantum node.

This atomic structure uses a W-type atomic level technique to create nonlinear interactions that photonic qubits lack, combining photon durability and scalability with atom interaction capabilities. This technology also eliminates the need for photon indistinguishability, a significant drawback of linear-optics.

Photon-Atom Gates: SWAP and CZ Are Key

The multigate node supports two photon-atom gates: SWAP and Controlled-Z (CZ). Quantum information processing relies on these nanosecond gates, which are compatible with spectrum or mixed temporal photons.

Their insensitivity to exact photon waveforms is due to the huge temporal divergence between the photonic qubit’s rapid light-matter interaction and the atomic qubit’s long ground state coherence lifetime.

The SWAP Gate

The SWAP gate maintains and expands the entanglement structure by transferring the atomic qubit’s quantum state onto a new photonic qubit. While building sophisticated photonic graph states, a photon becomes entangled with an atomic qubit. The SWAP operation maps the atomic entanglement onto a freshly generated photon, “swapping” the quantum information from the atom to the photon. This is necessary for multi-photon entangled state assembly.

SWAP gate mechanism: Single-Photon Raman Interaction (SPRINT). This method states that a single incoming photon “pushes” the atom into a “dark state” for the incoming mode, changing the atomic qubit. For the SWAP gate to work, both atomic transitions must be coupled to two orthogonal optical cavity modes. W-type atomic level schemes enable simultaneous SPRINT and conditional phase shift implementation in a single atom, making them essential here.

Simulations for the SWAP gate reveal process robustness and fidelity of over 99.6%. With this high fidelity even when using photons in spectrally mixed states, photon indistinguishability criteria are lowered, which is a major gain. These estimates are based on commercially viable resonator designs and realistic rubidium-87 atom parameters.

The CZ Gate controls

Objective: The CZ gate is needed to entangle a photon and an atomic qubit. Atomic qubits apply conditional phase shifts based on their states. This conditional phase shift entangles the qubits.

Mechanism: The CZ gate functions through a conditional 𝜋-phase shift. One atomic transition is resonantly coupled to the cavity mode in this arrangement. In a given beginning state, the photon-atom state only enters a 𝜋 phase when a single photon is incident. The conditional phase shift causes entanglement and defines the CZ gate.

Fidelity and Robustness: Simulations show the CZ gate has process fidelities above 99.8%. Like the SWAP gate, it works well with spectrally impure photon wavepackets because its high-fidelity operation only depends on the photon’s power spectrum, not its entire spectral coherence. The need for precise waveform shaping or close synchronisation is reduced further.

Build and Connect Complex Photonic States

These CZ and SWAP gates enable the deterministic generation and construction of complex photonic graph states for measurement-based quantum computing and other quantum information processing applications.

Typically, a CZ gate entangles a photon with an atomic qubit, then a SWAP operation converts the atomic state into a new photonic qubit while keeping the entanglement structure. This process can be performed over many connected nodes to construct larger graph states.

“Stitching” is a powerful aspect of the system that goes beyond graph states. A deterministic, nondestructive method for combining graph states from distinct modules is stitching. Stitching routes photonic qubits through a shared atomic gate, unlike destructive fusion-based methods that need accurate temporal control and photon measurements that may cause loss.

Entanglement is temporarily mediated by the atom. Entanglement is achieved by transforming the atomic state into a new photonic qubit using CZ gates when two photons from different modules interact. This method maintains coherence, tolerates photon fluctuation, and prevents photon loss, enabling modular and scalable photonic structures without losing fidelity.

Modularity and Scalability for Future Quantum Systems

The architecture’s flexibility and tunability help scale photonic quantum computers. Dynamically redesigning quantum nodes using atom-cavity systems in real time can provide a stitching interface, gate unit, or photon source. Because resource allocation can be adjusted to specific applications or hardware, performance, hardware complexity, and error rates can be dynamically traded. More nodes speed up graph state generation, while fewer nodes lengthen the sequence but consume fewer atoms.

These modules can support hybrid topologies by being distributed across devices connected by optical fibres or co-located on a photonic chip connected by waveguides. All rubidium-87 atoms are intrinsically similar and can be controlled centrally, thus photons from one module can be reliably entangled by atoms in another for large-scale systems.

This method solves the scale problem of photonic  quantum computing by assigning photon-photon interaction to the atom. Due to its predictable, rapid, and modular deployment, the plan can minimise physical overhead while retaining quantum coherence.