Quantum leap for Australian physics

Story Jeannette Langan

The quest to unlock the uncharted capabilities of quantum mechanics have received a major funding boost with the Griffith Centre for Quantum Dynamics securing almost $900,000 in Australian Research Council grants for two cutting-edge research projects.

This adds to the more than one million dollars the centre received last year to advance experimental quantum computer technology and to establish the Australian Attosecond Science Facility (AASF), the only one of its type outside the United States and Europe.

Dr Erik Streed and Dr David Kielpinski secured more than $500,000 to further their work constructing the building blocks of a working quantum computer.

This follows their success in April this year, when Kielpinski and Streed made Australian history by trapping a string of ions in a vacuum chamber, providing the basic hardware for a quantum computer.

Trapped ions are widely tipped as the most promising technique in the race for a quantum computer.

Dr Streed said that while computers form a critical component of the world’s economy, they are currently limited by classical physics.

"Quantum computers offer revolutionary solutions to some of these limitations by taking advantage of quantum physics, and have been shown to have the potential for completely secure data communication, as well as number factoring and database searching at speeds far greater than the fastest classical computers," he said.

Dr Robert Sang and Dr David Kielpinski also secured a second grant to utilise the capabilities of the AASF, which is set to open at Griffith later this year.

Dr Sang said the project would look at the physics of atoms in ultra-strong laser fields.

"The laser will be able to literally rip an electron off an atom, accelerating it away and then smashing it back. This violent collision produces laser-like radiation in the extreme ultraviolet and soft x-ray regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.

"This will give the AASF some of the capabilities of a synchrotron, providing Queensland-based students and researchers with the ability to observe basic physical and biological processes at work."