10144591QNAV2 - Quantum Enhanced Navigation 2ActiveCollaborative R&DInnovate UKOver reliance on GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite system) for modern infrastructure such as position, navigation and timing is a well-documented and a timely challenge. Spoofing and jamming of the timing and location signals makes navigation by GNSS vulnerable to bad actors, with many notable examples of such attacks affecting both military and commercial targets. An alternative to using global position signals is to determine your location via dead-reckoning using inertial navigation. With any inertial navigation system (INS) the positioning error grows with time since the last independent reference, owing to measurement error and drifts accumulated in the inertial measurement unit (IMU). Hence it is critical to establish accurate, drift free IMUs to increase navigation accuracy and reliance from GNSS sabotage or outage. QNAV2 builds on the work done in the last few years from ColdQuantaUK (CQUK d.b.a. Infleqtion) and QinetiQ (QQ) on alternative navigation systems based on quantum technologies, and adds to it the expertise of the team at Quantum Technologies Associates (QTA) on dual-use PNT capability needs, applied quantum systems engineering, and independent test, validation and assurance of quantum PNT systems. The outcome of this project will be the development and validation of a quantum-enhanced rotation sensor using atom interferometry. Developing upon the single axis system built in QNAV we will use this existing system to explore and understand in more detail the physics and initial performance of our sensor. Of main concern will be the dependence of sensitivity and stability on system parameters such as atom beam temperature, temperature scale factors, and environmental noise. System upgrades will then be built and validated to confirm performance enhancements, including controlled real-world testing. Our goal is to create a more optimised, robust, and high-performance single-beam, single-axis system. Refining the single-axis Q-IMU allows the most efficient and cost-effective way to progress confidently towards a 6-axis solution, the product that ultimately will be commercialised by CQUK.