IGERT: Interdisciplinary Quantum Information Science and Engineering: a Graduate Research and Training Program

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This Integrative Graduate Education and Research Training (IGERT) award supports the development of an interdisciplinary graduate program in quantum information science and engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The field of quantum information lies at the intersection of science and engineering, addressing the behavior of computers and communication systems at the most microscopic scales, where quantum mechanics becomes important. It is a rapidly developing field, incorporating elements of physics, mathematics, computer science, chemistry, and engineering. The MIT program will develop a unified, multidisciplinary curriculum in quantum information that will include laboratory and teaching experiences, as well as summer internships with international consortium partners from academia, industry, and government. Student theses will emphasize the interplay between theory and experiment, and between science and engineering. Each year, the program will offer a week-long quantum information summer school for college seniors, to encourage women and underrepresented minorities to enter the field. Through cohort development activities, a required seminar on research ethics, and interactions with consortium partners, students will learn to become responsible and responsive members of the international scientific and engineering community. Society is increasingly demanding more and better information devices and systems, and continued United States leadership in these application areas depends on cultivating our best young minds in new ways. Breakthrough technologies ? for secure communications, precision measurements, and supercomputers ? will surely depend on quantum-mechanical behaviors. The MIT program will prepare students to meet these demands. By transcending traditional disciplinary boundaries and by creating innovative educational techniques, its graduates will bring much-needed quantum expertise to academia, to government, and to the industries that will develop and produce quantum technologies. IGERT is an NSF-wide program intended to meet the challenges of educating U.S. Ph.D. scientists and engineers with the interdisciplinary background, deep knowledge in a chosen discipline, and the technical, professional, and personal skills needed for the career demands of the future. The program is intended to catalyze a cultural change in graduate education by establishing innovative new models for graduate education and training in a fertile environment for collaborative research that transcends traditional disciplinary boundaries.