Measuring two-qubit gates

Abstract

Accurate characterization of two-qubit gates will be critical for any realization of quantum computation. We discuss a range of measurements for characterizing two-qubit gates. These measures are architecture-independent and span a range of complexity from simple measurement routines to full quantum-state and process tomography. Simple indicative measures, which flag but do not quantify gate operation in the quantum regime, include the fringe visibility, parity, Bell-state fidelity, and entanglement witnesses. Quantitative measures of gate output states include linear entropy and tangle; measures of, and error bounds to, whole-gate operation are provided by metrics such as process fidelity, process distance, and average gate fidelity. We discuss which measures are appropriate, given the stage of development of the gate, and highlight connections between them. © 2007 Optical Society of America.