Electron-spin-resonance transistors for quantum computing in silicon-germanium heterostructures

Abstract

We apply the full power of modern electronic band-structure engineering and epitaxial heterostructures to design a transistor that can sense and control a single-donor electron spin. Spin-resonance transistors may form the technological basis for quantum information processing. One- and two-qubit operations are performed by applying a gate bias. The bias electric field pulls the electron wave function away from the dopant ion into layers of different alloy composition. Owing to the variation of the g factor $(\mathrm{Si}:g=1.998,\mathrm{Ge}:g=1.563),$ this displacement changes the spin Zeeman energy, allowing single-qubit operations. By displacing the electron even further, the overlap with neighboring qubits is affected, which allows two-qubit operations. Certain silicon-germanium alloys allow a qubit spacing as large as 200 nm, which is well within the capabilities of current lithographic techniques. We discuss manufacturing limitations and issues regarding scaling up to a large size computer.