Public Funding for Skylark Lasers Limited

_The NX Micro COTS laser system for quantum gravity gradiometry_ project brings together a team of academic and industry experts to enhance existing technical capabilities within quantum technologies and accelerate the commercialisation process of Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) sensors. The key deliverable of this project is a state-of-the-art laser system to control the quantum state of a sample of atoms within a quantum gravity sensor. The laser system is based on solid-state laser technology, which shows critical advantages compared to other laser sources. Current solid-state quantum lasers are large and expensive, and whilst they provide a good solution for research purposes, they promise limited scalability and hence are hard to justify in integration and product development projects. Other technologies, such as distributed feedback (DFB) lasers provide a more economical option but they lack the superior performance of a solid-state platform. Our proposal brings diode-pumped solid-state technology much closer to the price point of a DFB laser, while also providing all the advantages existing solid-state lasers offer. Furthermore, we work with Heriot Watt University and Glasgow University to integrate these lasers into a packaged, system-level solution, providing a turn-key product to existing quantum sensor manufacturers, saving costs, space and complexity in their development process. The proposed solution is unique in terms of its functionality and the overall system costs a fraction of existing products. We will validate and test our system in existing gravity gradient map matching capabilities, in collaboration with Delta g.

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

UV-lifetime extension project 

QT Assemble brings together a consortium of UK companies to develop highly-innovative assembly and integration processes for new markets in quantum technologies. Waveguide writing, nanoscale alignment and monolithic integration will be used to deliver new levels of performance in robust and reliable platforms. High-performance components and systems will be demonstrated including highly-integrated lases, photon sources, photon detectors and ultra-cold matter systems. New commercial opportunities have been identified that require reliable and robust operation in quantum sensing and quantum information processing markets.

no public description

Single-Frequency UV Lasers for OEM Applications

"Despite our increasing ability to detect and monitor objects that exist on land, sea, around buildings or in space, our ability to detect objects beneath the ground has not improved significantly. When it comes to attempting to locate a buried and forgotten pipe, telling the extent of a sink hole or assessing the quality of infrastructure we still often resort to digging or drilling holes. This presents a huge economic and societal cost as road networks are dug up, oil wells are dry or brown-field land is left undeveloped. Existing techniques are all fundamentally limited in either their sensitivity (classical microgravity), their penetration (Ground Penetrating Radar) or their cost (seismic). For over 30 years, universities and academics have been exploiting the strange effects of quantum superposition to measure gravity with astonishing sensitivity. Using a process called cold-atom interferometry, the wave-partial duality of a rubidium atom is compared to the phase of a laser beam in a way which can detect very small changes in the way atoms fall freely in a vacuum. Changes in this free-fall can be used to determine the local strength of gravity and if this measurement is sensitive enough, the measurement can be used to tell whether there are voids, pipes, tunnels, oil and gas reserves in the ground beneath your feet. Although the potential is there, there are huge scientific and engineering challenges to delivering this performance. This project is proposed by the UK consortium of the best scientific and engineering companies the UK has to offer. Working with leading UK universities, these companies are looking to overcome these challenges, and develop a new industry of 'quantum' cold-atom sensors in the UK. If these advanced performances can be demonstrated, the economic and societal benefit of this new 'quantum' industry in the UK is expected to be significant and long-lasting."

Quantum technologies are considered to have a similarly wide and ubiquitous social impact that electronics have enjoyed after the invention of the transistor, but to achieve this it will be necessary to make a vital transition from research labs and large scale installations into industrial and consumer markets. In particular, the development of compact and rugged single-frequency light sources is required by QT to manipulate the quantum states of atoms and ions. In this project, using our innovative propriotery technology platform, we will develop a compact single-frequency solid-state laser for controlling quantum states of Strontium atoms via light-matter interaction at their near-Infrared transition at 813nm. We will reduce the size and cost of this critical component enormously, without losing performance, in order to place the UK at the vanguard of QT development and commercialisation.

Quantum technologies are braced to have a similarly wide and ubiquitous social impact that electronics have enjoyed since the invention of the transistor, but to achieve this it will be necessary to miniaturise all the component subsystems, in particular the single-frequency lasers sources needed to manipulate the quantum states of atoms and ions. In this project we will develop ultra-compact solid-state lasers, using an innovative design to extend the wavelength coverage and functionality of microchip lasers. The development of such compact and rugged sources of single-frequency light sources will be instrumental in paving the way for quantum technologies to reach their full potential and make the transition from research labs and large scale installations into industrial and consumer markets.

It is difficult to overestimate the impact of electronic computers on modern society – and yet, just a few decades ago, computer technology was a creature of the research laboratory due to their enormous complexity, power requirement, and cost. The uptake of such technology by wider, non-specialist society was only possible once improvements in the size, cost and performance of the subsystems upon which computers depend had been realised. Quantum technology finds itself at a similar junction. These systems are now a reality and hold enormous potential to revolutionise our lives, but they are only found in research laboratories because they depend upon very expensive, very large laser systems. In this project, we will reduce the size and cost of these critical components enormously, without losing performance, in order to place the UK at the vanguard of QT development and commercialisation.