Speaker
Description
Superconducting qubits, widely employed in quantum computing, are emerging as promising candidates for innovative particle detection methods due to their sensitivity to small energy deposits. In this work, we explore the potential of transmon qubits as particle detectors through experiments conducted on a chip manufactured at the Superconducting Quantum Materials and Systems (SQMS) Center at Fermilab and tested in a shielded underground facility at the INFN Gran Sasso Laboratory (LNGS). The system was fully characterized using GEANT4-based simulations and irradiated with gamma sources of variable activity to assess the qubits' response to different levels of radiation.
Using a fast decay detection protocol with tens of microseconds resolution, we monitored the state transitions of the qubits. Results show that transmons successfully detect particle interactions under controlled gamma irradiation, demonstrating a correlation between radiation exposure and state changes. However, in the absence of controlled gamma sources, similar rates of radiation-like events were observed on chips tested both above ground at Fermilab and underground at LNGS, demonstrating that intrinsic noise sources dominate over cosmic and environmental radiation.
This study offers new insights into the use of superconducting qubits as particle detectors and highlights the need of identifying and mitigating dominant noise sources to improve detector performance and advance quantum-enhanced instrumentation.
