RESEARCH NEWS
The Würzburg physicists believe SiC with a vacancy defect to be a suitable candidate for this purpose. “The missing atom also has as a consequence that the crystal lattice lacks an electron, which in turn is equivalent to the spin that can be used as information carrier in a quantum computer,” Dyakonov explains. What’s more, the SiC technology is fairly well developed. LEDs, transistors, micro-electro-mechanical components or sensors made from this material are already on the market.
Exposing the material to light and radio waves The Würzburg physicists conducted their experiments in collaboration with researchers from Saint Petersburg. By “hitting” the silicon crystals simultaneously with light and radio waves, they were able to manipulate the spins in a targeted way, enabling them to store and retrieve information at will.
What the physicists are particularly enthusiastic about is the fact that the silicon vacancy qubits in a densely packed crystal behave almost like atoms with well-defined, very sharp optical resonances. “This is very unusual,” Astakhov adds.
“This is a new research field where experimental data of other study groups are still scarce at the moment. However, the reviewers looked favourably on our experiments and immediately recommended our manuscript for publication. We
are very curious to know how the scientific community will react to our study,” Astakhov reveals. The first reaction has already materialised; Astakhov has been invited to present his results at the Quantum Science Symposium in Cambridge.
Spin quantum computers not only require the ability to process information, but also to store the information for as long as possible. This is still a problem at this point, since the stray field of adjacent nuclei can gradually erase the information stored in the defects.
Therefore, the researchers from Würzburg and Saint Petersburg plan as a next step to produce SiC crystals that are formed from a silicon isotope without a magnetic moment. “We know that spin-free isotopes of silicon and carbon atoms exist,” concludes Astakhov. A SiC crystal exclusively consisting of such isotopes should therefore be capable of storing the information over a long period of time.
Further details of this work have been published in the paper, “Resonant addressing and manipulation of silicon vacancy qubits in silicon carbide”, by D. Riedel, et al in Physical Review Letters, 109, 226402 (2012). DOI:10.1103/ PhysRevLett.109.226402
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www.siliconsemiconductor.net Issue I 2013
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