Braidonium: a braiding quantum circuit based on the $4\pi$ Josephson effect

Abstract

We propose a topological qubit in which braiding and readout are mediated by the $4\pi$ Majorana-Josephson effect. The braidonium device consists of three Majorana nanowires that come together to make a tri-junction; in order to control the superconducting phase differences at the tri-junction the nanowires are enclosed in a ring made of a conventional superconductor; and in order to perform initialization/readout one of the nanowires is coupled to a fluxonium qubit through a topological Josephson junction. We analyze how flux-based control and readout protocols can be used to demonstrate braiding and qubit operation for realistic materials and circuit parameters.