Innovation Cluster for Quantum Technology

Herausforderung Quantentechnologie — Credit: Adobe Stock / Mopic

When large amounts of money are invested in the research of small things, it is because our leaders firmly believe that our society and economic future can be shaped this way. These “small things” mean the objects and phenomena of the quantum world. Science is increasingly succeeding in taking control of this world. The range of topics spans from quantum communication with its inherent secure data transmission to quantum computers for unimagined processing power and to quantum simulations of chemical reactions and quantum sensors for medical diagnostics. Great technological promise with enormous economic potential is popping up in these fields. This potential is being raised on a large scale by the European Commission’s levied billion euro “Quantum Technologies Flagship” funding program and beyond that, it’s being pushed forward in flanking national funding programs. At the same time, not only large companies with long traditions, but also young start-ups are pushing developments which will bring entirely new products to the market which are based on quantum technology (QT).

Just as PTB was once – thanks to its measuring skills – at the beginning of quantum mechanics, PTB is now driving the second quantum revolution’s wave of metrological possibilities – with the next generations of atomic clocks, even more precise electrical standards and innovative measurement capabilities in medicine. At the same time, the metrological fundamental research leads to technological applications. To make these applications available for the economic development of QT, the Quantum Technology Competence Center (QTZ) was recently founded.

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Im blauen Licht eines Systems aus Lasern arbeitet ein Wissenschaftler mit Schutzbrille

Quantentechnologien ermöglichen völlig neue Anwendungen für zahlreiche Industriesektoren. Um das enorme Potenzial zu erkennen und in die Praxis umzusetzen, braucht es Fachkräfte. Gerade für den Transfer vom Labor in die Industrie und die Produktentwicklung fehlt qualifiziertes Personal – und eine zentrale Anlaufstelle für ihre Fortbildung. Daher startete am 13. Januar das Verbundprojekt Quantum...

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Symbolbild: Ein roter Schirm überspannt mehrere blaue Schirme

Die Quantenkommunikation verspricht durch Ausnutzung quantenmechanischer Effekte eine abhörsichere Übertragung von Informationen. Eine der zurzeit am weitesten erforschten Anwendungsfälle ist die quantenbasierte Schlüsselverteilung. Nach intensiver Forschung auf diesem Gebiet steht nun der technologische Sprung in die Wirtschaft bevor: Das Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung (BMBF) fördert...

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The aim in an international research project called AQuRA (Advanced Quantum Clock for Real-World Application) is to build an optical atomic clock that is based on neutral atoms and is both accurate and robust within 3.5 years. With this clock, using complicated laboratory setups or relying on atomic clock specialists will be a thing of the past for everyday practical applications, such as when...

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Optical atomic clock with highly charged ions

Optical atomic clocks are the most accurate measurement devices ever built, and they have become a key technology in fundamental and applied research used, for example, in testing the stability of natural constants or for geodetic height measurements. As part of a collaboration within the QuantumFrontiers Cluster of Excellence, researchers from the QUEST Institute at PTB have developed the...

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Quantenuhren können so genau messen, dass sie in Geodäsie und Klimaforschung als empfindliche Sensoren dienen können, um die Oberfläche der Erde genauer zu vermessen oder die Erhöhung des Meeresspiegels aufgrund der Klimaerwärmung zu verstehen. Doch bislang sind diese Uhren sehr aufwendige wissenschaftliche Geräte, die von Atomuhrspezialistinnen und spezialisten betrieben werden müssen. Ein gerade...

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TimekeepersTimekeepers

Timely: Excited atom (glowing) in an optical clock

If you think of passing hours, minutes and seconds when you imagine a clock, you’re not wrong, but not completely right, either. When clocks measure time very accurately, scientists can do much more than just state the time:

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Quantum magnetic-field sensorsQuantum magnetic-field sensors

In twos: Pairs of electrons tunnel through a barrier in a SQUID.

While homo sapiens may not be able to detect magnetic fields, as “homo technicus”, human beings make use of a wide variety of technical sensors. Quantum effects are increasingly being exploited to collect information unavailable by conventional means – for example, in order to detect magnetic fields in living organisms or to use such fields for medical imaging purposes.

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Walking into the trapWalking into the trap

Trapped: The chip structure of an ion trap

The discovery that the world is governed by principles of quantum mechanics is over 100 years old. Today, we take many technological applications of quantum physics for granted – from lasers and semiconductor technology to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The applications of second-generation quantum technology currently emerging go a step further, allowing individual quantum objects to be controlled and deliberately exploiting basic quantum effects for technological innovations in the near and distant future.

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Electrical Quantum MetrologyElectrical Quantum Metrology

Counted: electrons are tunneling through a SET device.

Historically speaking, not much time has passed since Nicola Tesla dazzled audiences with his controlled bursts of lightning and ghostly seeming light effects and a certain Thomas Alva Edison electrified the industrialized world with his inventions. The discovery and technical utilization of electricity took off at the end of the 19th century and conquered more and more conventional technical terrain until, in the late 1940s, the transistor was invented at Bell Labs in New Jersey. The transistor gave electricity its first quantum-mechanical form.

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Less light! The key to quantum cryptographyLess light! The key to quantum cryptography

In particles: Light as a stream of individual photons

Information is the most important resource of our time. Enormous amounts of data are collected, processed in computers and exchanged via glass fibers, the air and satellites. We are caught up in information flows that never break and that race around the length and breadth of the globe at the speed of light. Much of this data has to be exchanged between the sender and the receiver in a safe way, as not everything that is communicated is allowed or supposed to be in the public eye. This includes patients’ data in the field of medicine as well as financial data that is communicated with and between banks and highly sensitive data from the fields of politics and the economy. Forms of communication that are protected from unauthorized access are necessary for all these data transfers.

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The Quantum Technology Competence Center (QTZ)The Quantum Technology Competence Center (QTZ)

Architectural sketch of the new QTZ building in Braunschweig

Only very few people have so far become accustomed to the phenomena of the quantum world. Yet the technologies that come out of this world are to be used by everyone. PTB is therefore specifically expanding its fundamental research and its highly specialized services to include a Quantum Technology Competence Center (QTZ) that focusses on applications. Work on setting up this center began in 2019, and the QTZ is going to form an important basis for industrial developments of quantum technologies. Special focus will be placed on start-ups as well as on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

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