ColdQuanta Announces First Project with Oak Ridge National Labs

(HPC.Wire) ColdQuanta, a leader in Cold Atom Quantum Technology, today announced the company has embarked on its first project under the newly branded Quantum Research as a Service (QRaaS) Division to build a Custom Ion Trap System for Oak Ridge National Labs (ORNL). The QRaaS division sits alongside the company’s Quantum Computing and Cold Atom Technology groups, and is dedicated to discovering breakthrough technology in support of government and enterprises. The Oak Ridge system will apply thoughtful engineering to create a high performance and modular system that enables rapid testing of cryogenic electronics, ion trap architectures, and system integration strategies. The cryogenic ion trapping system combines the modular design and systems engineering that ColdQuanta has demonstrated in several of its products to produce a reliable system that is tailored to the customer’s needs for testing and prototyping ion trap hardware.
In recent years, ion traps have been increasingly integrated into cryogenic systems to achieve improved vacuum performance and decreased noise. Trapped ion experiments typically require bulky, one-off vacuum systems, and cryogenic experiments add yet another layer of complexity that requires more expertise and time for system design and construction. ColdQuanta’s ion trapping system addresses these challenges by including a macroscopic vacuum chamber with integrated electronics, active and passive vacuum pumping mechanisms, an atomic source, thermal links, a compact helical resonator, and trapping electronics all contained within the cryostation chamber.

The cryogenic ion trapping systems fuels quantum adoption in the following ways:
Experimental architectures utilizing trapped ions are useful for applications such as computing, time keeping, and networking/communications.
Robust experimental hardware provides high performance and flexibility, which are critical for a research setting.
System integration of vacuum hardware in a cryogenic environment results in high performing compact ion trap systems.

“ORNL’s cryogenic ion trapping systems is the perfect type of project for ColdQuanta’s Quantum Research as a Service division because it furthers adoption of quantum in familiar areas like computing, networking, and simulation,” said Max Perez, general manager, Quantum Research as a Service, at ColdQuanta. “Our mission at ColdQuanta is to show how accessible quantum can be at making everyday applications better, faster and more efficient. We’re pleased that ORNL selected us to help bring this mission to life through the cryogenic ion trapping system.”