Building and exploiting high quantum volume ion-trap processors

Trapped-ion devices have demonstrated, on a small number of qubits, all the building-blocks required to build a quantum computer with precision better than any competing technology. The aim of this project is to develop and utilise a world-class intermediate-scale quantum computer that, by virtue of high-fidelity any-qubit-to-any-qubit entangling gates along with low error rates, will operate at a performance level currently unachievable in any other architecture.

Over the course of the studentship, we will develop and evalualte techniques
to achieve high fidelity control of small registers of qubits, and approach the 50-qubit level while maintain entanglement fidelities beyond the state of the art.

The project will involve both experimental and theoretical work, including:
- building an apparatus that uses a newly developed type of trapped-ion qubit
- obtaining precision coherent control over individual atomic ions
- developing and applying new theoretical tools to understand and optimise many-qubit couplings