QKD Satellite Ground-Station PhD Proposal

In 2020 a proposal for a satellite constellation for a UK long distance QKD network was proposed [1] as a national security capability, spurred by the growing need to be ready for post-quantum security. To do this, a fleet of satellite sources will downlink to a series of NIR optical ground-stations. The group's goal is to develop the technologies to make this possible, and my place will be mainly working on the ground station. Following on from the previous student Elliot Hasting's work, the ground station needs to be able to align with great accuracy to a moving satellite and measure the very lossy quantum signal. The current state of the ground station is that we have a telescope and a measurement system, these need to work with a satellite source. For this PhD I need to make the telescope into a full "Bob" in the QKD protocol, able to point at a moving satellite; align the quantum measurement optics with a source a minimum of 575km away; compensate for the atmospheric distortion and motion of the satellite on the quantum signal and generate a shared key. This will start with doing this full protocol with a copy of the satellite "Alice" module on the ground over a distance of a few hundreds of meters. And then after a CubeSat is launched to do the same from Earth to Ground. My work on the ground-station also enables several other engineering challenges to be overcome,
including increasing the ground station portability, making the receive module telescope agnostic, making the ground station capable of transmission and further making it capable of transmitting an entanglement from an atom in a lab far from the ground station to a satellite. We could also achieve a few other "firsts" like installing an Alice module on any moving vehicle and transmitting to the now mobile telescope, including drones, ships, balloons, or helicopters, obviously some of these are more accessible than others.

Our ambitions for the impact of the Quantum Engineering CDT are simple and clear: our PhD graduates will be the key talent that creates a new, thriving, globally-competitive quantum industry within the UK. In Bristol we will provide an entire ecosystem for innovation in quantum technologies (QT). Our strong and diverse research base includes strengths going from quantum foundations to algorithms, experimental quantum science to quantum hardware. What makes Bristol unique is our strong innovation and entrepreneurship focus that is deeply embedded in the entire culture of the CDT and beyond. This is reflected in our recent successful venture QTEC, the Quantum Technologies Enterprise Centre, and our Quantum Technologies Innovation Centre (QTIC), which are already enabling industry and entrepreneurs to set up their own QT activities in Bristol. This all occurs alongside internationally recognised incubators/accelerators SetSquared, EngineShed, and UnitDX.

At the centre of this ecosystem lies the CDT. We will not just be supplying existing industry with deeply trained talent, but they will become the CEOs and CTOs of new QT companies. We are already well along this path: 7 Bristol PhD students are currently involved in QT start-ups and 3 alumni have founded their own companies. We expect this number to rise significantly when the first CDT cohort graduates next year (2 students have already secured start-up positions). Equally, it is likely that our graduates will be the first quantum engineers to make new innovations in existing classical technology companies - this is an important aspect, as e.g. the existing photonics, aerospace and telecommunications industries will also need QT experts.

The portfolio of talent with which each CDT graduate will be equipped makes them uniquely suited to many roles in this future QT space. They will have a deep knowledge of their subject, having produced world-leading research, but will also understand how to turn basic science into a product. They will have worked with individuals in their cohort with very different skills background, making them invaluable to companies in the future who need these interdisciplinary team skills to bring about quantum innovations in their own companies. Such skills in teamworking, project management, and self-lead innovation are evidenced by the hugely successful Quantum Innovation Lab (QIL). The idea and development of QIL is entirely student-driven: it brings together diverse industrial partners such as Deutsche Bank, Hitachi, and MSquared Lasers, Airbus, BT, and Leonardo - the competition to take part in QIL shows the hunger by national industry for QT in general, and our students' skills and abilities specifically. With this in mind, our Programme has been co-developed with local, UK, and international companies which are presently investing in QT, such as Airbus, BT, Google, Heilbronn, Hitachi, HPE, IDQuantique, Keysight, Microsoft, Oxford Instruments, and Rigetti. The technologies we target should lead to products in the short and medium term, not just the longer term. The first UK-wide fibre-based quantum communication network will likely involve an academic-industrial partnership with our CDT graduates leading the way. Quantum sensing devices are likely to be the product of individual innovators within the CDT and supported by QTIC in the form of spin-outs. Our graduates will be well-positioned to contribute to the advancement of quantum simulation and computing hardware, as developed by e.g. our partners Google, Microsoft and Rigetti. New to the CDT will be enhanced training in quantum software: this is an area where the UK has a strong chance to play a key role. Our CDT graduates will be able to contribute to all aspects of the software stack required for first-generation quantum computers and simulators, the potential impact of which is shown by the current flurry of global activity in this area.