Wave Photonics, a startup based in Cambridge, UK, has been selected to lead a £500k Innovate UK feasibility study project to create photonics chips for trapped ion quantum computers. Partners in the project include Oxford Ionics, the CORNERSTONE foundry at the University of Southampton and the Compound Semiconductor Applications (CSA) Catapult.
The idea is to use precisely controlled lasers to remove one of the electrons from trapped ions to form qubits, which are then controlled at extremely low error rates using electric fields.
The SiNQ project (Silicon Nitride for Quantum Computing) will apply component design and optimisation techniques in development at Wave Photonics to design better performing devices faster to work with the multiple wavelengths of light that are needed for trapped ion quantum computers.
Wave Photonics will be building upon its core photonics design capability and software to create component designs for the huge span of wavelengths needed to readout and manipulate the trapped ions.
