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New technology centre to accelerate digital innovation with the power of light

New Photonic Integration Technology Center (PITC) to advance innovations for global technological and societal challenges with revolutionary chip technology.

On 2 June 2021, the integrated photonics industry accelerator PhotonDelta, research institute TNO, Eindhoven University of Technology and University of Twente will sign a cooperation agreement for the new Photonic Integration Technology Center (PITC) in the Netherlands. This centre will speed up the commercialisation of Integrated Photonics for applications such as autonomous mobility, healthcare, data & communications. The signing will be part of an online launch event which is open to everyone who has registered through https://pitc.nl/launch/
Integrated Photonics represents a revolutionary technology that allows the development of chips that can sense, capture and process huge amounts of data using light instead of electricity. By using light we can create new types of devices and systems, complementary to those that use electronics. Photonic integrated circuits pave the way for devices and systems that are cheaper, faster, lighter, more robust and reliable while using less energy. This opens new perspectives for developing purposeful digital solutions.

Bridging the gap between research and application

The new PITC is an independent R&D and innovation centre that brings photonic technologies to industrial maturity, builds partnerships, strengthens the photonics ecosystem, and links it to a global customer base.

Accelerating commercial adoption of integrated photonics

Customers get access to technology and know-how at an early stage while sharing the costs and risk of new technology development. The jointly developed innovations will be extensively tested for reliability and stability, facilitating the route to production.

Integrated photonics is a key enabling technology with a wide spectrum of applications allowing to respond promptly and efficiently to societal challenges of today and tomorrow.” says Carlos Lee, General Director of European Photonics Industry Consortium (EPIC), “The Photonic Integration Technology Center brings the integrated photonics to a level that it can be easily adopted by industry. This great ambition makes the PITC a perfect fit to the EPIC ecosystem.”
PITC offering

Specific PITC tasks will be:

  1. Developing technology in shared innovation programs
  2. Ensuring a smooth path to manufacturing ans commercialisation
  3. Providing access to high-tech infrastructure and facilities
  4. Supporting talent development for skilled professionals that build tomorrow’s high-tech ecosystem in the Netherlands.

PITC is a cooperation between PhotonDelta, TNO, University of Twente and Eindhoven University of Technology, and is enabled by Brainport Development, the Ministry of Economic Affairs & Climate, regional growth accelerators BOM and OostNL and the provinces of Noord-Brabant, Overijssel and Gelderland. PITC is located on the premises of Eindhoven University of Technology and University of Twente in the Netherlands.

Original press release PITC

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Albert Polman receives ERC Advanced Research Grant to develop a new type of quantum electron microscope

Albert Polman, professor of nanophotonics and photovoltaics at UvA and AMOLF group leader, has received an Advanced Research Grant of 2.5 million euros from the European Research Council. Polman will use the grant to develop a new type of quantum electron microscope.

In the awarded project, Polman will use intense laser pulses to tailor the energy spectrum of high-energy electrons in a scanning electron microscope. This provides a unique way to control the quantum-mechanical electron wave packet in space and time. By combining materials excitation using these wavepackets and the detection of light that is emitted (cathodoluminescence) this creates an entirely new way of analytical electron microscopy.

ERC Advanced Research Grant

ERC Advanced Grants support excellent researchers at the career stage at which they are already established research leaders with a recognised track-record of research achievements. Candidates have to demonstrate the ground-breaking nature, ambition and feasibility of their scientific proposal. The projects must be hosted at institutions in the EU or associated countries.

The European Research Council uses the ERC Advanced grants to allow outstanding research leaders to pursue ground-breaking, high-risk projects in Europe. Read the ERC press release here.

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Quantum photonic Qmode project with Quix and Phix has started

The Dutch companies QuiX and PHIX started a collaboration in the project Qmode to overcome the packaging challenges of connecting large-scale quantum photonic processors to the outside world.

The Qmode project is funded with an MIT-R&D collaboration project grant from the Province Overijssel, dedicated to stimulate the innovation and development of products, processes and services of local SMEs working in the Dutch Top Sectors. The collaboration established in Qmode will help QuiX secure a leading position in the market for photonic quantum computing, while PHIX expands its expertise and services in the packaging and assembly of large photonic chips. The Qmode project reinforces the centrality of the Province Overijssel in the Dutch photonics landscape by recognizing and supporting the development of the innovative technologies developed by QuiX and PHIX.

PUSH THE LIMITS OF THE STATE OF THE ART IN INTEGRATED PHOTONICS

Within the Qmode project, QuiX and PHIX work together to connect a large quantum photonic processor of 50 input/output modes to the outside world. This involves more than 100 optical fiber connections, up to 5000 electrical connections, and new challenges in heat dissipation. Consequently, new techniques are required that push the limits of the current state of the art in integrated photonics packaging and assembly.

ADVANTAGE OF PHOTONIC QUANTUM COMPUTERS

Large-scale ( 50 modes) and fully reconfigurable quantum photonic processors are needed to demonstrate a real advantage of photonic quantum computers over classical supercomputers. Photonic quantum computing is attracting increasing attention as an alternative platform to quantum computers using other types of qubits such as, e.g., superconducting qubits. As these photonic processors scale to sizes involving thousands of tunable elements and hundreds of optical modes, new challenges arise in the packaging of these chips to connect them to surrounding components.

ABOUT QUIX

QuiX develops quantum photonic processors for quantum information processing and simulation. Using the proprietary TriPleX platform, QuiX provides unique quantum photonic processors that are not only large-scale and fully reconfigurable but also low loss and widely transparent to all suitable quantum light sources. QuiX demonstrated the world’s largest quantum photonic processor in a product launch last December, which can be found below.

ABOUT PHIX

PHIX Photonics Assembly offers packaging and assembly services for all major photonic integrated circuit (PIC) technology platforms, such as indium phosphide, silicon photonics, silicon nitride, and planar lightwave circuit. PHIX is specialized in hybrid integration of chip-to-chip and fiber-to-chip modules and provides a one-stop-shop for optoelectronic module assembly, from design to volume production. From a state-of-the-art facility in Enschede, The Netherlands, PHIX supports the global industrial development of PIC-enabled modules.

Source article: Kennispark Twente

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Quantum photonics company Quix sells first photonic processor

QuiX, located at Kennispark Twente and cooperation partner of the ANP cluster for Applied Nanotechnology at the University of Twente, confirms with this sale that it is a leader in the world of light technology. With this photonics technology, they are making an important contribution to the development of the first quantum computers. These do not yet exist, but their introduction is coming ever closer. These computers are going to change the world radically, is the prediction. Just think of personalised medication. With quantum computing, it is possible to calculate exactly what the composition and quantity of a medicine should be for an individual. However, the fields of application are much broader. The technology can be used in sectors such as MedTech, the chip industry and agriculture. What is the best time to sow (precision agriculture), can you ‘smell’ cancer through your breath and therefore detect it earlier, and when does an aircraft need specific maintenance? The trick is to calculate exactly what the right moment is, with the help of a computer that can make unprecedented calculations.

Photonic processors from QuiX

QuiX develops quantum photonic processors for quantum information processing and simulation. Using the proprietary TriPleX platform, QuiX provides unique quantum photonic processors that are not only large-scale and fully reconfigurable but also low loss and widely transparent to all suitable quantum light sources. QuiX demonstrated the world’s largest quantum photonic processor in a product launch last December, which can be found here:

QONTROL as first consumer

Qontrol, based in Bristol (UK), makes control electronics and supporting infrastructure for complex, massively multi-channel photonic integrated circuits (PICs). These PICs are now finding uses from telecommunications to fundamental science, and Qontrol’s products can be found powering them, in research labs worldwide.

Jelmer Renema, CTO of QuiX: “This is great news for QuiX. Qontrol is one of the leading quantum photonics technologies companies in Europe. This shows how QuiX can meet the most stringent technological requirements for quantum photonics.”

“We are thrilled and honoured to be the first to be able to kick the tires on QuiX’s awesome new line of photonic processors,” said Dr Josh Silverstone, Qontrol’s CTO. “With this device in our Bristol labs, we will be able to better understand and serve our customer’s needs, and particularly those customers wanting to put QuiX’s technology to use. It will be a fantastic tool for us to demonstrate what our own products can do, too, with the device’s visible-light capability promising to make for fabulous live demos.”

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