Flatiron Institute Seminar Series: Simon Trebst

Title: Quantum Computing “al dente”

Abstract: From the perspective of many-body physics, the transmon qubit architecture currently developed for quantum computing in scalable platforms by IBM, Google, and other consortia are systems of coupled nonlinear quantum resonators. In practice, one needs to find a balance between protecting qubits via intentional disorder / frequency detuning and the ability to manipulate qubits via nonlinear resonator couplings — but with chaos lurking to take over the many-body localized phase, will this be possible?

In this talk, I will provide quantitative answers to this question by discussing various independent diagnostics of localization theory in the context of numerical simulations and address how much imperfection one should embrace in a transmon chip. Building a scalable quantum computer turns out to be surprisingly close to coming up with a perfect recipe for spaghetti “al dente” — a culinary perspective that we will gladly adopt for this talk.