Control-enhanced non-Markovian quantum metrology

Abstract

Quantum metrology promises unprecedented precision of parameter estimation, but it is often vulnerable to noise. While significant efforts have been devoted to improving the metrology performance in Markovian environments, practical control schemes specifically designed for non-Markovian noises are much less investigated. Here, we propose two control-enhanced quantum metrology schemes that are suitable for tackling general non-Markovian noises described by noise channels or noise spectra. We conduct experiments to verify the efficacy of these schemes on a nuclear magnetic resonance system. The experimental results involving multiqubit probes show that the parameter estimation precision can be greatly improved, significantly surpassing the standard quantum limit, with our schemes. At present, non-Markovian noises are widely encountered on diverse quantum devices, the proposed schemes are relevant for realistic metrology applications on these platforms. Quantum metrology, a powerful paradigm for surpassing classical measurement precision, has been extensively studied for Markovian noise, while most practical physical processes obey non-Markovian dynamics. In this paper, the authors propose control-enhanced quantum metrology schemes to counteract non-Markovian noise and experimentally verify their efficacy.