Vacuum Characterization of a Compact Room-temperature Trapped Ion System

TL;DR

This paper introduces a compact, robust, room-temperature trapped ion system with a miniaturized vacuum chamber, demonstrating effective ion trapping and vacuum characterization suitable for quantum computing applications.

Contribution

It presents a novel ultra-compact vacuum package and system design that maintains ultra-high vacuum levels for trapped ion quantum computing.

Findings

Achieved vacuum pressure of approximately 1.5e-11 Torr.

Successfully trapped and characterized $^{174}$Yb$^+$ ions.

Demonstrated system stability and robustness in a small form factor.

Abstract

We present the design and vacuum performance of a compact room-temperature trapped ion system for quantum computing, consisting of a ultra-high vacuum (UHV) package, a micro-fabricated surface trap and a small form-factor ion pump. The system is designed to maximize mechanical stability and robustness by minimizing the system size and weight. The internal volume of the UHV package is only 2 cm$^3$, a significant reduction in comparison with conventional vacuum chambers used in trapped ion experiments. We demonstrate trapping of $^{174}$Yb$^+$ ions in this system and characterize the vacuum level in the UHV package by monitoring both the rates of ion hopping in a double-well potential and ion chain reordering events. The calculated pressure in this vacuum package is about 1.5e-11 Torr, which is sufficient for the majority of current trapped ion experiments.