Integrating organic-molecule single-photon sources with atomic quantum memories

量子互联网承诺将量子技术的优势传播到物理距离上，这将通过分布式量子计算将量子计算机的能力赋予用户，以及量子通信和密码协议的保护，以前所未有的安全将政府、企业和个人连接起来。就像今天的互联网从一个学术工具转变为一个在过去30年里改变了我们生活的工具一样，量子互联网有可能改变加拿大人和世界各地人们与量子技术互动和使用的方式。这一合作将解决与量子通信技术硬件开发相关的一个突出挑战：开发一种实用的光-物质接口，即量子存储器，它处理和存储量子数据。原子量子存储器，就像在勒布朗实验室开发的那样，已经展示了在带宽、存储时间和效率方面具有出色性能的潜力。然而，使用原子的优势之一(原子跃迁的完美性)通常意味着传统的量子光发射器(单光子源)太宽，与这些存储器不兼容。为了解决这个问题，Clark团队一直在研究聚合物包裹的有机纳米晶体的单光子发射，其性质与量子存储器的原子跃迁非常匹配。在这个Catalyst项目中，LeBlanc和Clark团队开始合作，使用Clark的单光子发射器和LeBlanc的原子量子存储器制作系统原型。通过这项工作，他们将为推动这一组合技术向现实世界的应用和设备发展奠定基础，包括量子中继器和通信中心硬件。

The quantum internet promises to spread the advantages of quantum technology across physical distances, which will give the power of a quantum computer to users through distributed quantum computing, as well as the protection of quantum communications and cryptography protocols to connect governments, businesses and individuals with unprecedented security. Just as today's internet shifted from an academic tool to one that has transformed our lives over the past three decades, the quantum internet has the potential to transform the ways Canadians, and people around the world interact with and use quantum technology.This collaboration will address an outstanding challenge related to hardware development for quantum communications technologies: developing a practical light-matter interface, known as a quantum memory, which processes and stores quantum data. Atomic quantum memories, like the ones developed in the LeBlanc lab, have demonstrated the potential for excellent performance in terms of their bandwidth, storage time, and efficiency. However, one of the advantages of using atoms (the perfection of the atomic transition) generally means that conventional emitters of quantum light (single photon sources) are too broadband to be compatible with these memories. To address this issue, the Clark group has been investigating polymer-encapsulated organic nanocrystals for single photon emission, whose properties are an excellent match for the atomic transitions of a quantum memory.In this Catalyst project, the LeBlanc and Clark groups initiate a collaboration to prototype a system that uses Clark's single-photon emitters with LeBlanc's atomic quantum memories. Through this work, they will build the foundation for advancing this combined technology toward real-world applications and devices, including and quantum repeaters and communications hub hardware.