Blue Laser Integration with Networked Quantum-Memories (BLINQ)

One of the largest outstanding challenges faced by photonic quantum computing is how to scale these systems based on existing single photon sources.

Single photons are natural carriers of quantum information. They are robust to thermal noise, can be used at room-temperature and sent over optical fibre networks. This makes them particularly suitable for generation, manipulation, and long-range transport of entanglement.

However, existing sources of single photons are probabilistic; they do not generate a steady stream of high-quality, predictable photons on demand. This forces developers to build photonic quantum computers with large amounts of redundancy, repeating many copies of the underlying components over and over in the hope that at least some portion of the operation is successful. This approach is not efficient or readily scalable.

ORCA Computing have developed a new approach to quantum computing based on a proprietary photonic quantum memory; a means of storing and retrieving successful quantum states on demand. This approach reduces the cost, footprint, and energy use of quantum operations and is designed to be scalable using mature telecoms components; but it still requires a compatible source of single photons that are tailored to interact with the memory.

Covesion are a world leading manufacturer of nonlinear optical crystals, a photonics technology used to convert standard telecoms lasers to single photons for use with quantum systems. Using cutting-edge fabrication techniques recently developed at the University of Southampton, this project will develop a new class of spectrally-tailored nonlinear crystals designed to operate, integrate, and commercially scale with ORCA's innovative quantum memory platform.