Graybox characterization and calibration with finite-shot estimation on superconducting-qubit experiments

Abstract Characterization and calibration of quantum devices are necessary steps to achieve fault-tolerant quantum computing. As quantum devices become more sophisticated, it is increasingly essential to rely not only on physics-based models but also on machine learning models with open-loop optimization. The Graybox approach is a recently proposed platform-agnostic method offering flexibility in modeling the implicit noise. Despite promising results in photonic qubits, its suitability for other platforms is still unknown. We investigate its performance and limitations under realistic conditions, both numerically and experimentally, for the characterization and calibration of gates on superconducting-qubit devices. We find that the Graybox approach performs well on the devices’ pulse-level controls and is able to search for pulse shapes of high-fidelity gates. However, an important limiting factor of the model’s ability to reduce the training errors is the finite number of measurement shots. We therefore derive analytical bounds to explain this limitation, and use them to indicate users whether the characterization performance is optimized. Furthermore, the model’s predictability also depends on other factors such as parameter drift that may occur between the characterization and calibration processes. Our results provide insights into quantum device characterization and gate optimization on superconducting qubits under realistic scenarios using the Graybox approach.