Fast adiabatic qubit gates using only $\sigma_z$ control

Abstract

A controlled-phase gate was demonstrated in superconducting Xmon transmon qubits with fidelity reaching 99.4%, relying on the adiabatic interaction between the |11> and |02> states. Here we explain the theoretical concepts behind this protocol that achieves fast gate times with only $\sigma_z$ control of the Hamiltonian, based on a theory of non-linear mapping of state errors to a power spectral density and use of optimal window functions. With a solution given in the Fourier basis, optimization is shown to be straightforward for practical cases of an arbitrary state change and finite bandwidth of control signals. We find that errors below $10^{-4}$ are readily achievable for realistic control waveforms.