Quantum News Briefs November 11 begins with Germany’s announcement that it will “Create Its First Quantum Computing Business Cloud”; followed by Delft Circuits news that it was chosen by NASA JPL for BICEP Project in Antarctica; third explains that IBM met with Biden Administration about controls on quantum computing; four is TU Dresden joining the Quantum Internet Alliance + MORE.
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Germany to Create Its First Quantum Computing Business Cloud
The project, called SeQenC, will run for three years and is part of the ministry’s “Digital Technologies for Business” support program. The ministry will be investing tens of millions of euros, although no exact figure was named.
During the project’s three-year span, selected partner companies from industry and the wider economy will be invited to test out applications in sectors such as telecommunications, logistics, finance, automotive and energy.
The project is the latest in a series of quantum computing initiating to come from the BMWK. In late September, the ministry announced that it would put EUR 14 million into a quantum processer prototype developed on the basis of photonic systems. The BMWK has pledged to invest EUR 740 million in quantum computing as a whole. Click here to read announcement from Germany Trade & Invest in-entirety.
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Delft Circuits chosen by NASA JPL scientist to support BICEP Project in Antarctica
The Background Imaging of Cosmic Extragalactic Polarization project (BICEP) has been ongoing for several years and is now seeking solutions for a hardware upgrade to its telescope’s sensitivity as the project digs ever deeper into the cosmos to learn more about the origins of the universe. Consequently, a team at JPL is pioneering a new way to scale the number of detectors on the high optical frequency receivers of the telescope array.
The team at the Jet Propulsion Lab has determined that advanced cables made by Delft Circuits will be installed in the telescope’s cryostat, as part of its new camera. The team will also replace the telescope’s sensors with new thermal kinetic inductance detectors (TKIDs), which are superconductive detectors leveraging the properties of quantum mechanics. Once the new equipment is installed, the experiment will determine if the frequency multiplexing enabled by this new technology will allow for the necessary scaling of the telescope’s detectors to greater sensitivities.
“I was very happy to find Delft Circuits, which was able to meet our stringent requirements for transmitting microwave frequencies, flexibility and cryogenic performance in a single cable. This makes my work considerably easier” said Lorenzo Minutolo of Caltech and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory affiliate. “The cables perform well and remain flexible at any temperature. This is beneficial for us because they make it much simpler to assemble the hardware we need for this Antarctica upgrade. We can therefore devote more time and resources to other aspects of the experiment, which helps us reach our objectives faster and at a reduced expense.”
The Cri/oFlex multi-channel and RF cryogenic I/O cables which will be used inside the BICEP Array telescope are durable and flexible, rather than rigid like the alternative. This provides users the opportunity to design and test multiple prototypes in their process, while reusing the cables over and over for each different iteration. This had not been possible before, thus providing significant value for users both in terms of cost and setup time. Click to read entire announcement.
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IBM met with Biden Administration about export controls on quantum computers
IBM recommended that any regulations, if developed, cover potentially problematic uses of quantum computing rather than limiting the technology based simply on processing power, said Dario Gil, head of IBM Research. Quantum technology will likely be subject to constraints like export controls, Gil said. “We will continue to be an active participant in that dialogue,” he said.
IBM has installed quantum infrastructure in countries like Germany and Japan, but not China, Gil said. The Biden administration is exploring the possibility of new export controls that would limit China’s access to quantum along with other powerful emerging technologies, Bloomberg News recently reported.
Click here to read article, NOTE: paywall.
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TU Dresden has joined the Quantum Internet Alliance
Prof. Frank H. P. Fitzek and Asst. Prof. Riccardo Bassoli from the Deutsche Telekom Chair of Communication Networks are representing TUD in the joint project. Together with 40 partners from science and industry, they are researching a prototype for an innovative European quantum internet. Both researchers are primarily interested in how quantum technology can be used to improve telecommunication networks in the future.
Prof. Frank H. P. Fitzek and Asst. Prof. Riccardo Bassoli focus on the definition and characterization of specific applications for the quantum internet. Identifying applications for a technology that, strictly speaking, doesn’t exist yet is a true challenge. In addition, they are working on identifying the performance metrics required by quantum communication technologies to support 5G and future 6G use cases. The focus is on seamless integration between future 6G networks and quantum communication technologies.
Founded in 2017 by the European market leaders QuTech, ICFO, the University of Innsbruck and the Paris Centre for Quantum Computing, the Quantum Internet Alliance is a team of academic institutions, telecommunication operators, system integrators and quantum tech start-ups from all over Europe. QIA receives funding from the EU Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme. In its first project phase covering a period of 3.5 years, QIA has been awarded a total budget of 24 million euros.
Click here to read the announcement in-entirety.
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Access to University of Chicago’s Pritzker Nanofabrication Facility enables quantum research for Superconducting Quantum Materials and Systems Center at Fermilab
It’s a state-of-the-art user facility where researchers can fabricate superconducting quantum devices with different materials and processes. The SQMS researchers are are disentangling the architecture of quantum devices and studying each material to see how they affect the devices’ performance.
“This is a great example of collaboration between the university and Fermilab with outstanding results,” said Juan de Pablo, University of Chicago executive vice president for science, innovation, national laboratories and global initiatives. “Fermilab’s scientists needed a state-of-the-art nanofabrication facility to advance their research, and they were able to conveniently access it through the university. Working together, we can scale projects like this one and answer questions in a field of vital importance.”
the SQMS Center has established and launched a new nanofabrication taskforce within the center. It constitutes a large-scale, nationally coordinated effort toward qubit devices’ performance improvement.
Moreover, with access to this nearby fabrication facility, students and principal investigators at the SQMS Center can work together to design and fabricate superconducting quantum devices, thus training the next generation of quantum computing researchers.
“Being able to see the design of our quantum devices on the screen come to life through the work of our nanofab team enables us to test different qubit designs with different materials,” said Shaojiang Zhu, who leads the superconducting qubit design and simulation team. “Our first devices have shown high-quality factors, which paves the way to build better superconducting qubits.”
Click here to read the article in-entirety.
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Sandra K. Helsel, Ph.D. has been researching and reporting on frontier technologies since 1990. She has her Ph.D. from the University of Arizona.