Fast Nondestructive Readout for High-Clock-Rate Atom Array Quantum Processor

Abstract:Neutral-atom arrays have rapidly advanced to support thousands of qubits and execute high-fidelity logical operations. However, these processors remain severely throttled by their slowest fundamental operation: nondestructive qubit measurement, which requires milliseconds and fundamentally limits the system's clock rate. This bottleneck arises from both an inherent photon-budget dilemma---sufficient fluorescence for reliable state discrimination must be collected without excessive heating or loss---and frame-based imaging, which imposes one common exposure and decision latency on intrinsically independent, site-local measurements. Here, we overcome these limitations with a fast, nondestructive readout architecture based on real-time, site-resolved adaptive protection. By integrating continuous photon counting with a dynamic feedforward framework, we decode qubit states with sub-microsecond latency and instantly shield atoms from redundant scattering. Demonstrated in parallel across a 100-qubit reconfigurable atom array, with adaptive protection on a 25-site subarray, this dynamic decision protocol reduces the average probe time to just $15\ \mu\text{s}$. Model-free benchmarking yields a discrimination infidelity of $4.1 \times 10^{-5}$ and an atom loss of $2.1 \times 10^{-4}$, simultaneously setting new performance records for atom arrays. Exploiting this capability, we operate repeated quantum circuits at an unprecedented 1.7 kHz clock rate with atoms reused over 120 consecutive rounds---nearly sevenfold higher than the previous record---and enter the sub-millisecond cycle regime for the first time. By removing nondestructive readout as the dominant cycle-time bottleneck, this work unlocks high-clock-rate mid-circuit syndrome extraction, paving the way for high-throughput, fault-tolerant quantum computation.

Quantum Physics (quant-ph); Atomic Physics (physics.atom-ph)

arXiv:2608.17189 [quant-ph]

(or arXiv:2608.17189v1 [quant-ph] for this version)

https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2608.17189 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)

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