I. Arrazola

Symmetry-protected topological phases have fundamentally changed our understanding of quantum matter. An archetypal example of such a quantum phase of matter is the Haldane phase, containing the spin-1 Heisenberg chain. The intrinsic quantum nature of such phases, however, often makes it challenging to study them using classical means. Here, we use trapped-ion qutrits to natively engineer spin-1 chains within the Haldane phase. Using a scalable, deterministic procedure to prepare the Affleck-Kennedy-Lieb-Tasaki (AKLT) state within the Haldane phase, we study the topological features of this system on a qudit quantum processor. Notably, we verify the long-range string order of the state, despite its short-range correlations, and observe spin fractionalization of the physical spin-1 particles into effective qubits at the chain edges, a defining feature of this system. The native realization of Haldane physics on a qudit quantum processor and the scalable preparation procedures open the door to the efficient exploration of a wide range of systems beyond spin-1/2

Robust qubit-qubit interactions mediated by bosonic modes are central to many quantum technologies. Existing proposals combining fast oscillator-mediated gates with dynamical decoupling require strong pulses or fast control over the qubit-boson coupling. Here, we present a method based on dynamical decoupling techniques that leads to faster-than-dispersive entanglement gates with low-intensity pulses. Our method is general, i.e., it is applicable to any quantum platform that has qubits interacting with bosonic mediators via longitudinal coupling. Moreover, the protocol provides robustness to fluctuations in qubit frequencies and control fields, while also being resistant to common errors such as frequency shifts and heating in the mediator as well as crosstalk effects. We illustrate our method with an implementation for trapped ions coupled via magnetic field gradients. With detailed numerical simulations, we show that entanglement gates with infidelities of $10^{-3}$ or $10^{-4}$ are possible with current or near-future experimental setups, respectively.

In this Thesis we design radiation patterns capable of creating effective light-matter interactions suited to applications in quantum computing, quantum simulation and quantum sensing. On the one hand, we have used dynamical decoupling techniques to design quantum operations that are robust against errors in environmental and control fields, achieving high-fidelity quantum logic in trapped ions and energy-efficient nuclear magnetic resonance at the nanoscale with nitrogen-vacancy centers in diamond. On the other hand, we have studied generalised models of light-matter interaction, leading to the discovery of selective multi-photon interactions in the Rabi-Stark model and a proposal for preparing non-classical quantum states using the nonlinear quantum Rabi model. Finally, we have shown how the appropriate tailoring of interactions among ultracold atoms in optical lattices could lead to solve the boson sampling problem faster than the best supercomputers, thus demonstrating quantum supremacy. In this manner, we believe the results presented here significantly expand our knowledge on the control of light-matter interactions, and provide optimal scenarios for current quantum devices to generate the next-generation of quantum applications.

We present a method that combines continuous and pulsed microwave radiation patterns to achieve robust interactions among hyperfine trapped ions placed in a magnetic field gradient. More specifically, our scheme displays continuous microwave drivings with modulated phases, phase flips, and $π$ pulses. This leads to high-fidelity entangling gates which are resilient against magnetic field fluctuations, changes on the microwave amplitudes, and crosstalk effects. Our protocol runs with arbitrary values of microwave power, which includes the technologically relevant case of low microwave intensities. We demonstrate the performance of our method with detailed numerical simulations that take into account the main sources of decoherence.

We demonstrate the emergence of selective $k$-photon interactions in the strong and ultrastrong coupling regimes of the quantum Rabi model with a Stark coupling term. In particular, we show that the interplay between the rotating and counter-rotating terms produces multi-photon interactions whose resonance frequencies depend, due to the Stark term, on the state of the bosonic mode. We develop an analytical framework to explain these $k$-photon interactions by using time-dependent perturbation theory. Finally, we propose a method to achieve the quantum simulation of the quantum Rabi model with a Stark term by using the internal and vibrational degrees of freedom of a trapped ion, and demonstrate its performance with numerical simulations considering realistic physical parameters.

We propose a pulsed dynamical decoupling protocol as the generator of tunable, fast, and robust quantum phase gates between two microwave-driven trapped ion hyperfine qubits. The protocol consists of sequences of $π$-pulses acting on ions that are oriented along an externally applied magnetic field gradient. In contrast to existing approaches, in our design the two vibrational modes of the ion chain cooperate under the influence of the external microwave driving to achieve significantly increased gate speeds. Our scheme is robust against the dominant noise sources, which are errors on the magnetic field and microwave pulse intensities, as well as motional heating, predicting two-qubit gates with fidelities above $99.9\%$ in tens of microseconds.

We propose the implementation of a switch of particle statistics with an embedding quantum simulator. By encoding both Bose-Einstein and Fermi-Dirac statistics into an enlarged Hilbert space, the statistics of quantum particles may be changed in situ during the time evolution, from bosons to fermions and from fermions to bosons, as many times as desired. We illustrate our proposal with few-qubit examples, although the protocol is straightforwardly extendable to larger numbers of particles. This proposal can be implemented on different quantum platforms such as trapped ions, quantum photonics, and superconducting circuits, among others. The possibility to implement permutation symmetrization and antisymmetrization of quantum particles enhances the toolbox of quantum simulations, for unphysical operations as well as for symmetry transformations.

We propose a method to simulate spin models in trapped ions using a digital-analog approach, consisting in a suitable gate decomposition in terms of analog blocks and digital steps. In this way, we show that the quantum dynamics of an enhanced variety of spin models could be implemented with substantially less number of gates than a fully digital approach. Typically, analog blocks are built of multipartite dynamics providing the complexity of the simulated model, while the digital steps are local operations bringing versatility to it. Finally, we describe a possible experimental implementation in trapped-ion technologies.