Robustness of dynamical decoupling sequences

TL;DR

This paper experimentally compares the robustness of various dynamical decoupling sequences in quantum systems, highlighting how pulse imperfections impact their effectiveness in protecting quantum states.

Contribution

It provides a precise experimental comparison of different DD sequences' robustness against control pulse errors in a controlled environment.

Findings

Certain DD sequences show higher robustness to pulse imperfections.

Pulse errors significantly affect the effectiveness of DD sequences.

Experimental results guide optimal DD sequence selection for quantum protection.

Abstract

Active protection of quantum states is an essential prerequisite for the implementation of quantum computing. Dynamical decoupling (DD) is a promising approach that applies sequences of control pulses to the system in order to reduce the adverse effect of system-environment interactions. Since every hardware device has finite precision, the errors of the DD control pulses can themselves destroy the stored information rather than protect it. We experimentally compare the performance of different DD sequences in the presence of an environment that was chosen such that all relevant DD sequences can equally suppress its effect on the system. Under these conditions, the remaining decay of the qubits under DD allows us to compare very precisely the robustness of the different DD sequences with respect to imperfections of the control pulses.