Mitigating Errors in DC Magnetometry via Zero-Noise Extrapolation

Abstract: Zero-noise extrapolation (ZNE), a technique to estimate quantum circuit expectation values through noise scaling and extrapolation, is well-studied in the context of quantum computing. We examine the applicability of ZNE to the field of quantum sensing. Focusing on the problem of DC magnetometry using the Ramsey protocol, we show that the sensitivity (in the sense of the minimum detectable signal) does not improve upon using ZNE in the slope detection scheme. On the other hand, signals of sufficiently large magnitude can be estimated more accurately. Our results are robust across various noise models and design choices for the ZNE protocols, including both single-qubit and multi-qubit entanglement-based sensing.