Quantification of Robustness, Leakage, and Seepage for Composite and Adiabatic Gates on Modern NISQ Systems

Because processors based on superconducting qubits are inherently noisy, schemes for increased performance that yield higher fidelity, robustness, or improved error correction could be beneficial. Focusing on leakage, seepage, and robustness, we implemented single-qubit gates from composite and adiabatic pulses on a transmon qubit and assessed their performance relative to default pulses in terms of robustness and seepage and leakage rates using interleaved and leakage randomized benchmarking. Unsurprisingly, these pulses did not lead to marked reductions in leakage or seepage rates because they were not designed to do so. However, they were able to compensate for a broader range of systematic drive amplitude and off-resonance errors compared with standard gates. In some cases, using these pulses improved robustness by nearly an order of magnitude. These pulses could be useful for improving quantum error correction protocols or in contexts where cross-talk and calibration drift are problematic.