Neutral-atom arrays have emerged as a leading platform for scalable quantum computing, combining excellent coherence, optical control of large qubit ensembles, and flexible all-to-all connectivity. Achieving fault tolerance, however, requires efficient error detection and correction. Ytterbium offers unique advantages through its metastable-state qubits: leakage to the ground state can be independently detected, converting physical errors into erasures with known locations, while single-photon excitation to Rydberg states enables scalable, high-fidelity two qubit gates. We report progress toward improving two-qubit entangling gate fidelities in a 171Yb array. The gate is primarily limited by the finite Rydberg lifetime; recent upgrades to our ultraviolet excitation system enable higher Rabi frequencies that mitigate this effect. We develop new experimental optimization techniques, and compare our results with simulations to better understand the current limitations. These advances mark a key step toward scalable, fault-tolerant quantum computing with neutral atoms.
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