Ultra-long relaxation of a Kramers qubit formed in a bilayer graphene quantum dot

The intrinsic valley degree of freedom makes bilayer graphene a unique platform for emerging types of semiconducting qubits. The single-carrier quantum dot ground state exhibits a two-fold degeneracy where the two states have opposite spin and valley quantum numbers. By breaking the time-reversal symmetry of this ground state with an out-of-plane magnetic field, a novel type of qubit (Kramers qubit), encoded in the two-dimensional spin-valley subspace, becomes accessible. The Kramers qubit is robust against known spin- and valley-mixing mechanisms, as it requires a simultaneous change of both quantum numbers, potentially resulting in long relaxation and coherence times. We measure the relaxation time of a single carrier in the excited states of a bilayer graphene quantum dot at small (~ mT) and zero magnetic fields. We demonstrate ultra-long spin-valley relaxation times of the Kramers qubit exceeding 30~s, which is about two orders of magnitude longer than the spin relaxation time of 400~ms. The demonstrated high-fidelity single-shot readout and long relaxation times are the foundation for novel, long-lived semiconductor qubits.