News

Rob Thew and Hugo Zbinden have been awarded the Quantum Transitional Measures Grant from the SNF! This four-year funding is intended to allow the group to continue its cutting-edge research into quantum communication and quantum technologies.

A new publication from our work with integrated micro-ring resonators is now out in Physical Review A! This work demonstrates a novel, fast, frequency-tunable narrow bandwidth photon-pair source. This is an important step towards interfacing our integrated technologies with quantum memories based on atomic systems, for realisation of quantum networks.

How can we ensure our data is secure when carrying out day-to-day transactions? Quantum physics has the answer! By using photons, a secret key can be securely transmitted between two users, so allowing them to privately communicate. But up to now, the efficiency with which the photons were detected has restricted more widespread use of this technology. Our team has broken the record for secret key rate transmission by a factor of 6! The results are out now in Nature Photonics.

More great news from our ETPA research! A new paper by the group gives a theoretical analysis of ETPA to better understand how its cross-section in chromophores (the part of a molecule responsible for its colour) varies, depending on the coherence time of the incident entangled photon-pair and the excited states of the chromophore. The team found a periodic dependence on the coherence time, with the predictions confirmed by molecular quantum mechanical calculations for several chromophores.

A new paper from our quantum sensing efforts is out! We studied five chemical compounds (chlorins) from Pacific brittle stars, which can be used in anticancer therapies where light is exploited to destroy cancer cells. By measuring the phosphorescence of singlet oxygen produced by the chlorins, we discovered they made a large quantum yield when illuminated. These studies identify an arsenal of brittle star chlorins with great potential for application in photodynamic anticancer therapies.

Fadri Grünenfelder has received his PhD for work related to Quantum Key Distribution Thesis Title: Performance, Security and Network Integration of Simplified BB84 Quantum Key Distribution

The public open day for the Ancienne Ecole de Médecine saw enormous interest in the activities of the university of Geneva and our activities. Thousands turned out to visit the new and the old building and enjoy the demonstrations and explanations of our research in quantum science.

The official inauguration of the Ancienne Ecole de Médecine, took place on the 27th of September marking the return of the Department of Applied Physics to this landmark building in Geneva.

The Geneva Quantum Centre is a brand new initiative, bringing together all aspects of quantum science and technology at the University of Geneva.