Remote Entanglement of Trapped Atomic Ions.

Abstract

Since the development of quantum mechanics almost a century ago, there has been considerable controversy over the interpretations and predictions of quantum theory. Owing to the counterintuitive predictions of quantum mechanics, Einstein himself even wondered if this theory should be considered complete. While these questions have troubled many physicists over the past century, the development of the new field of quantum information science and the applications that may result from large scale quantum systems have brought many of these fundamental questions of quantum mechanics to the mainstream of not only theoretical but also experimental physics.

This thesis deals with a system at the heart of these questions - the first demonstration of quantum entanglement of two individual massive particles at a distance. I describe a theoretical and experimental framework for entanglement of two particles using trapped atomic ions. Trapped ions are among the most attractive systems for scalable quantum information protocols because they can be well isolated from the environment and manipulated easily with lasers. Using our trapped ion system, I show the first explicit demonstration of quantum entanglement between matter and light using a single ion and its single emitted photon. Further, by combining two such ion-photon entangled systems, I demonstrate the entanglement of two remotely located ions. These entanglement protocols, together with the recent developments of trapped ion quantum computing, can be used to create a platform for a scalable quantum information network, and perhaps confront some of the strangest features of quantum mechanics.