Description:

Title: Racing Towards the Quantum Revolution: Quantum Computation & Simulation with Cooper Pairs and Photons

Speaker: Jens Koch, Northwestern University

Abstract: Quantum mechanics has long served as a successful tool for describing the fundamental behavior of matter and radiation with great precision. Yet, we are only beginning to understand how to actively harness the laws of quantum mechanics for practical applications. Analyzing a given quantum object like an atom is rather different from inventing novel quantum devices with capabilities impossible to realize with technology rooted in classical physics. The ideas of quantum computation and quantum simulation are prominent highlights, but devising the appropriate quantum hardware for their realization has been a major challenge.

In the last years, the development of such hardware based on superconducting circuits and microwave photons has gained impressive momentum. I will discuss the quantum behavior of superconducting circuits and the crucial improvements that turned them into one of the most promising architectures for realizing a quantum computer. Our theoretical research has led to a deeper understanding of advanced superconducting circuits and points the way to next-generation devices even better protected from detrimental influences of the environment. I will further explain how quantum computation differs from quantum simulation, and present our work on simulators of open quantum systems which will shed light on the physics of nonequilibrium states of interacting many-body systems and dissipative phase transitions

Host: André de Gouvêa

Speaker Schedule

Keywords: Physics, Astronomy, colloquium