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Title: Oscillator state reconstruction via tunable qubit coupling in Markovian environments

Journal Article · · Physical Review. A
;  [1];  [2]
  1. Department of Physics and Astronomy, University College London, Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT (United Kingdom)
  2. QOLS, Blackett Laboratory, Imperial College London, SW7 2BW (United Kingdom)

We show that a parametrically coupled qubit can be used to fully reconstruct the quantum state of a harmonic oscillator even when both systems are subject to decoherence. By controlling the coupling strength of the qubit over time, the characteristic function of the oscillator at any phase-space point can be directly measured by combining the expectation values of two Pauli operators. The effect of decoherence can be filtered out from the measured data, provided a sufficient number of experimental runs are performed. In situations where full state reconstruction is not practical or not necessary, the method can still be used to estimate low-order moments of the mechanical quadratures. We also show that in the same framework it is possible to prepare superposition states of the oscillator. The model is very general but particularly appropriate for nanomechanical systems.

OSTI ID:
21550045
Journal Information:
Physical Review. A, Vol. 83, Issue 6; Other Information: DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevA.83.062120; (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics; ISSN 1050-2947
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English