Nicolas C. Menicucci

Precision metrology underpins scientific and technological advancements. Quantum metrology offers a pathway to surpass classical sensing limits by leveraging quantum states and measurement strategies. However, measuring multiple incompatible observables suffers from quantum backaction, where measurement of one observable pollutes a subsequent measurement of the other. This is a manifestation of Heisenberg's uncertainty principle for two non-commuting observables, such as position and momentum. Here, we demonstrate measurements of small changes in position and momentum where the uncertainties are simultaneously reduced below the standard quantum limit (SQL). We measure $\textit{modular observables}$ using tailored, highly non-classical states that ideally evade measurement backactions. The states are deterministically prepared in the single mode of the mechanical motion of a trapped ion using an optimal quantum control protocol. Our experiment uses grid states to measure small changes in position and momentum and shows a metrological gain of up to 5.1(5)~dB over the simultaneous SQL. Using an adaptive-phase estimation algorithm with Bayesian inference, we estimate these displacements with a combined variance of 2.6(1.1)~dB below the SQL. Furthermore, we examine simultaneously estimating $\textit{number}$ and $\textit{phase}$, which are the polar counterparts of position and momentum. This is performed by preparing a novel quantum resource -- number-phase states -- and we demonstrate a metrological gain over their SQL. The combination of quantum control and multi-parameter quantum metrology marks a significant step towards unprecedented precision with applications ranging from fundamental physics to advanced quantum technologies.

Quantum computers promise ultrafast performance of certain tasks. Experimentally appealing, measurement-based quantum computation (MBQC) requires an entangled resource called a cluster state, with long computations requiring large cluster states. Previously, the largest cluster state consisted of 8 photonic qubits or light modes, while the largest multipartite entangled state of any sort involved 14 trapped ions. These implementations involve quantum entities separated in space, and in general, each experimental apparatus is used only once. Here, we circumvent this inherent inefficiency by multiplexing light modes in the time domain. We deterministically generate and fully characterise a continuous-variable cluster state containing more than 10,000 entangled modes. This is, by 3 orders of magnitude, the largest entangled state ever created to date. The entangled modes are individually addressable wavepackets of light in two beams. Furthermore, we present an efficient scheme for MBQC on this cluster state based on sequential applications of quantum teleportation.

We propose a new experimental testbed that uses ions in the collective ground state of a static trap for studying the analog of quantum-field effects in cosmological spacetimes, including the Gibbons-Hawking effect for a single detector in de Sitter spacetime, as well as the possibility of modeling inflationary structure formation and the entanglement signature of de Sitter spacetime. To date, proposals for using trapped ions in analog gravity experiments have simulated the effect of gravity on the field modes by directly manipulating the ions' motion. In contrast, by associating laboratory time with conformal time in the simulated universe, we can encode the full effect of curvature in the modulation of the laser used to couple the ions' vibrational motion and electronic states. This model simplifies the experimental requirements for modeling the analog of an expanding universe using trapped ions and enlarges the validity of the ion-trap analogy to a wide range of interesting cases.

Spatial correlation functions provide a glimpse into the quantum correlations within a quantum system. Ions in a linear trap collectively form a nonuniform, discretized background on which a scalar field of phonons propagates. Trapped ions have the experimental advantage of each having their own "built-in" motional detector: electronic states that can be coupled, via an external laser, to the ion's vibrational motion. The post-interaction electronic state can be read out with high efficiency, giving a stochastic measurement record whose classical correlations reflect the quantum correlations of the ions' collective vibrational state. Here we calculate this general result, then we discuss the long detection-time limit and specialize to Gaussian states, and finally we compare the results for thermal versus squeezed states.

We show how a single trapped ion may be used to test a variety of important physical models realized as time-dependent harmonic oscillators. The ion itself functions as its own motional detector through laser-induced electronic transitions. Alsing et al. [Phys. Rev. Lett. 94, 220401 (2005)] proposed that an exponentially decaying trap frequency could be used to simulate (thermal) Gibbons-Hawking radiation in an expanding universe, but the Hamiltonian used was incorrect. We apply our general solution to this experimental proposal, correcting the result for a single ion and showing that while the actual spectrum is different from the Gibbons-Hawking case, it nevertheless shares an important experimental signature with this result.