Quantum oscillators for cavity electrodynamics in CMOS compatible silicon photonic chips

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The advent of the "information age" was the result of the astonishingly rapid, symbiotic development of scientific understanding and technological innovation involving first the electronic, and then the optical properties of matter. The transistor and the laser respectively symbolize the result of how progress in understanding the fundamental properties of electrons and photons begat more sophisticated physical and computational tools that made possible the solution of yet more complex and important scientific problems. The forefront of scientific inquiry in information science and technology is now focussed on quantum phenomena: how might quantum mechanics revolutionize (again) the way we solve problems or communicate information? Already a new discipline of quantum information science has identified quantum algorithms and quantum communication protocols that can, in principle, solve certain types of problems, or transmit secure information, that no classical information technology can. A wide range of different physical systems are being studied in order to identify practical ways of implementing these quantum information theories. This proposal focuses on one such system, chosen to take advantage of the tremendously powerful and sophisticated technology developed over the past 50 years by the microelectronics industry. We propose to study and develop nanometer sized semiconductor crystals (artificial atoms) that emit and absorb light in a manner compatible with a new class of silicon microchips designed to transport and manipulate quantum mechanical information over macroscopic distances. If suitable nanocrystals are found, this system will represent one of the few currently being considered, that is manifestly scalable to a practical quantum processing technology.