Quantum Campus shares the latest in quantum science and technology. Read by more than 1,400 researchers, we publish on Fridays and are always looking for news from across the country. Want to see your work featured? Submit your ideas to the editor.

New Mexico

The Wall Street Journal highlighted New Mexico’s efforts to attract quantum research investment this week — focusing on quantum encryption, national security, manufacturing, and their national labs’ role in DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative. The article also discussed the $50 million in coming investments by the state and a new Technology Innovation Division within its Economic Development Department.

“New Mexico pioneered applied physics for the first time with the Manhattan Project, and we’re in a great place to do it again with this quantum revolution under way,” Alex Greenberg, an economic development adviser to Gov. Michelle Lujan, told the Journal.

Read the full story.

Quantum key distribution

Researchers from Toshiba Europe used coherence-based twin-field quantum key distribution cryptography to transfer data across 250 kilometers on standard optical networking fiber at 110 bits per second. The demonstration did not rely on any specialized equipment like ultra-stable optical cavities and cryogenic photon detectors.

“Much higher performance QKD is now possible using commercially viable components,” Toshiba’s Robert Woodward told the Financial Times. “This paves the way for national and international scale deployment of quantum-secure communication infrastructure.”

This study appeared in Nature, accompanied by a summary in the journal’s Research Briefings section.

Hybrid analog-quantum simulation

Google Research published details a novel, analog-digital quantum simulator. Running on 69 superconducting qubits, it demonstrated several calculations often used in the study of magnetism like eigenstate thermalization.

“This hybrid platform features more versatile measurement capabilities compared with analogue-only simulators,” according to the team, and “the digital gates enable precise energy control.”

The work was published in Nature. Google also released a technical brief.

Potential fractional topological insulators

A team from Columbia and the University of Washington used transient optical spectroscopy to induce nearly 20 hidden states in twisted molybdenum ditelluride. A laser pulse is used to “melt the quantum states in the material and then a second detects the change in dielectric constant, a measure of the strength of electrical interactions, as the states re-emerge,” according to an announcement from Columbia. 

Several exhibited fractional fillings of the Chern bands, making them potential fractional topological insulators, fractional quantum spin Hall states, and non-abelian fractional states that could someday be used in topological quantum computers.

This study was published in Nature.

Quickbits

• Shortwave Infrared Light Detection and Ranging Using Silver Telluride Quantum Dots (Advanced Materials)

• Benchmarking the performance of quantum computing software for quantum circuit creation, manipulation and compilation (Nature Computational Science)

• Voltage detected single spin dynamics in diamond at ambient conditions (Nature Communications)

We hope you’ll make Quantum Campus one of your weekly reads. Like it? Be sure to share with your colleagues. Not your thing? Unsubscribe at the bottom of the page.