Phonon impact on the coherent control of quantum states in semiconductor quantum dots

This chapter is devoted to the recent theoretical results on the optical quantum control over charges confined in quantum dots under influence of phonons. We show that lattice relaxation processes lead to decoherence of the confined carrier states. The theoretical approach leading to a uniform, compact description of the phonon impact on carrier dynamics, perturbative in phonon couplings but applicable to arbitrary unperturbed evolution, is described in detail. Next, some applications are presented: phonon damping of Rabi oscillations in quantum dots and phonon-induced error of a single-qubit gate for an excitonic quantum dot qubit as well as for a semiconductor quantum dot spin qubit operated via a STIRAP transfer.