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Quantum Technology Briefing
Quantum Technology Briefing at the Institute of Physics
Quantum physics is at once mysterious and highly practical, underlying many inventions we take for granted in everyday life – such as the laser and the semiconductor microchip. The Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration in Quantum Information Processing (QIP IRC) is a 5-year, £10 million research initiative set up by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to focus UK activity in this area. Running from 2004 to 2009, the QIP IRC is now nearing its end and researchers gathered with representatives of science, business and government organizations at the Institute of Physics in London on 10 December to hear about what the collaboration has achieved.
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Quantum physics is at once mysterious and highly practical, underlying many inventions we take for granted in everyday life – such as the laser and the semiconductor microchip. The Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration in Quantum Information Processing (QIP IRC) is a 5-year, £10 million research initiative set up by the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council to focus UK activity in this area. Running from 2004 to 2009, the QIP IRC is now nearing its end and researchers gathered with representatives of science, business and government organizations at the Institute of Physics in London on 10 December to hear about what the collaboration has achieved.
The QIP IRC’s Director, Professor Andrew Briggs (University of Oxford), spoke of the UK origins of many key concepts in the field and how the QIP IRC had been established in order to continue this tradition of theoretical excellence and develop alongside it a thriving experimental activity to compete with very large investments overseas. Its success could be judged, he said, both by a portfolio of scientific work that commands attention worldwide and by the establishment of a vibrant community of (mostly young) researchers.
Professor Sir Peter Knight (Imperial College, Chair of the Defence Science Advisory Committee) explained the origins of the power of quantum physics in the possibility that a system can exist in a ‘superposition’ of two or more mutually contradictory states at the same time. The result is that it can explore all its different configurations in parallel, and hence perform certain operations, such as factoring a large number or searching a large database, much more quickly than a classical machine. The first revolution in quantum technologies was based on the discovery that quantum systems can have only well-defined, discrete energies; he forecast an imminent second revolution based on quantum correlations and the concepts of quantum information.
Professor John Rarity (University of Bristol) explained how quantum physics offers both a threat to secure communications - because it allows efficient factorization of large integers and thereby undermines public-key cryptography systems currently used to send information - and an opportunity, because it allows the fully secure exchange of cryptographic keys, with any eavesdropping detectable because it would disturb the subtle quantum correlations between the particles. QIP IRC researchers can now carry out quantum processing with light on a single chip, rather than in large laboratory-based experiments, and have demonstrated secure quantum communication over more than 100km in air, opening the door to applications from the re-keying of satellites to the establishment of secure links between bank customers and ATMs.
Dr Simon Benjamin (University of Oxford) reported on rapid progress towards practical realizations of other types of quantum devices; he showed how quantum information can be efficiently exchanged between the nuclei and the electrons of atoms, taking advantage of the ability to store it for long periods in nuclear form and manipulate it quickly in electronic form. He also showed how the sensitivity of quantum systems to their environment can be exploited to produce new types of sensor and showed how these ideas could be implemented using spins in molecules as well as with light.
Dr Hermann Hauser (Amadeus Capital Partners and Chair of the QIP IRC Board) gave a concluding presentation in which he stressed the importance of focusing in the long term on technologies such as QIP that have the potential for disruptive change in very large markets. He concluded that it is essential for players such as the UK to invest to remain at the forefront of the scientific fields while watching for ideas right for the development phase.
A lively panel discussion touched on when the QIP field would be ready for significant investment of private capital, which types of quantum technology would be best placed to follow quantum communications into the market in the medium term, and the need for the courage to invest at a high level when winning products are identified.
Andrew Fisher
The QIP IRC’s Director, Professor Andrew Briggs (University of Oxford), spoke of the UK origins of many key concepts in the field and how the QIP IRC had been established in order to continue this tradition of theoretical excellence and develop alongside it a thriving experimental activity to compete with very large investments overseas. Its success could be judged, he said, both by a portfolio of scientific work that commands attention worldwide and by the establishment of a vibrant community of (mostly young) researchers.
Professor Sir Peter Knight (Imperial College, Chair of the Defence Science Advisory Committee) explained the origins of the power of quantum physics in the possibility that a system can exist in a ‘superposition’ of two or more mutually contradictory states at the same time. The result is that it can explore all its different configurations in parallel, and hence perform certain operations, such as factoring a large number or searching a large database, much more quickly than a classical machine. The first revolution in quantum technologies was based on the discovery that quantum systems can have only well-defined, discrete energies; he forecast an imminent second revolution based on quantum correlations and the concepts of quantum information.
Professor John Rarity (University of Bristol) explained how quantum physics offers both a threat to secure communications - because it allows efficient factorization of large integers and thereby undermines public-key cryptography systems currently used to send information - and an opportunity, because it allows the fully secure exchange of cryptographic keys, with any eavesdropping detectable because it would disturb the subtle quantum correlations between the particles. QIP IRC researchers can now carry out quantum processing with light on a single chip, rather than in large laboratory-based experiments, and have demonstrated secure quantum communication over more than 100km in air, opening the door to applications from the re-keying of satellites to the establishment of secure links between bank customers and ATMs.
Dr Simon Benjamin (University of Oxford) reported on rapid progress towards practical realizations of other types of quantum devices; he showed how quantum information can be efficiently exchanged between the nuclei and the electrons of atoms, taking advantage of the ability to store it for long periods in nuclear form and manipulate it quickly in electronic form. He also showed how the sensitivity of quantum systems to their environment can be exploited to produce new types of sensor and showed how these ideas could be implemented using spins in molecules as well as with light.
Dr Hermann Hauser (Amadeus Capital Partners and Chair of the QIP IRC Board) gave a concluding presentation in which he stressed the importance of focusing in the long term on technologies such as QIP that have the potential for disruptive change in very large markets. He concluded that it is essential for players such as the UK to invest to remain at the forefront of the scientific fields while watching for ideas right for the development phase.
A lively panel discussion touched on when the QIP field would be ready for significant investment of private capital, which types of quantum technology would be best placed to follow quantum communications into the market in the medium term, and the need for the courage to invest at a high level when winning products are identified.
Andrew Fisher
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