Autonomous quantum error correction in a four-photon Kerr parametric oscillator

Abstract Autonomous quantum error correction has gained considerable attention to avoid complicated measurements and feedback. Despite its simplicity compared with the conventional measurement-based quantum error correction, it is still a far from practical technique because of significant hardware overhead. We propose an autonomous quantum error correction scheme for a rotational symmetric bosonic code in a four-photon Kerr parametric oscillator. Our scheme is the simplest possible error correction scheme that can surpass the break-even point—it requires only a single continuous microwave tone. We also introduce an unconditional reset scheme that requires one more continuous microwave tone in addition to that for the error correction. The key properties underlying this simplicity are protected quasienergy states of a four-photon Kerr parametric oscillator and the degeneracy in its quasienergy level structure. These properties eliminate the need for state-by-state correction in the Fock basis. Our schemes greatly reduce the complexity of autonomous quantum error correction and thus may accelerate the use of the bosonic code for practical quantum computation.