Tyler O'Neal, Staff Editor PHYSICS

Toshiba shrinks quantum key distribution technology to a semiconductor chip

Toshiba develops the world’s first QKD system based on the quantum transmitter, receiver, and random number generator chips; Quantum chips manufactured using standard semiconductor processes; Significant advances towards mass deployment of quantum communications

Toshiba Europe Ltd today announced it has developed the world’s first chip-based quantum key distribution (QKD) system. This advance will enable the mass manufacture of quantum security technology, bringing its application to a much wider range of scenarios including Internet of Things (IoT) solutions. A Toshiba scientist examines a QKD chip under the microscope at the company’s Cambridge Research Laboratory

QKD addresses the demand for cryptography which will remain secure from attack by the supercomputers of tomorrow. In particular, a large-scale quantum computer will be able to efficiently solve the difficult mathematical problems that are the basis of the public key cryptography widely used today for secure communications and e-commerce. In contrast, the protocols used for quantum cryptography can be proven secure from first principles and will not be vulnerable to attack by a quantum computer, or indeed any computer in the future.

The QKD market is expected to grow to approximately $20 billion worldwide in FY2035. Large quantum-secured fiber networks are currently under construction in Europe and South-East Asia, and there are plans to launch satellites that can extend the networks to a global scale. In October 2020, Toshiba released two products for fiber-based QKD, which are based on discrete optical components. Together with project partners, Toshiba has implemented quantum-secured metro networks and long-distance fiber-optic backbone links in the UK, Europe, the US, and Japan.  Overview of a chip-based quantum cryptography communication system

Manufacturing advances

For quantum cryptography to become as ubiquitous as the algorithmic cryptography we use today, the size, weight, and power consumption must be further reduced. This is especially true for extending QKD and quantum random number generators (QRNG) into new domains such as the last-mile connection to the customer or IoT. The development of chip-based solutions is essential to enabling mass-market applications, which will be integral to the realization of a quantum-ready economy.

Toshiba has developed techniques for shrinking the optical circuits used for QKD and QRNG into tiny semiconductor chips. These are not only much smaller and lighter than their fiber optic counterparts but also consume less power. Most significantly, many can be fabricated in parallel on the same semiconductor wafer using standard techniques used within the semiconductor industry, allowing them to be manufactured in much larger numbers. For example, the quantum transmitter chips developed by Toshiba measure just 2x6mm, allowing several hundred chips to be produced simultaneously on a wafer. 

Andrew Shields, Head of Quantum Technology at Toshiba Europe, remarked, “Photonic integration will allow us to manufacture quantum security devices in volume in a highly repeatable fashion. It will enable the production of quantum products in a smaller form factor, and subsequently, allow the rollout of QKD into a larger fraction of the telecom and datacom network.” 

Taro Shimada, Corporate Senior Vice President and Chief Digital Officer of Toshiba Corporation comments, “Toshiba has invested in quantum technology R&D in the UK for over two decades. This latest advancement is highly significant, as it will allow us to manufacture and deliver QKD in much larger quantities. It is an important milestone towards our vision of building a platform for quantum-safe communications based upon ubiquitous quantum security devices.” 

The Nobel Prize in Physics is awarded to Syukuro Manabe, Klaus Hasselman, Giorgio Parisi

Tyler O'Neal, Staff Editor PHYSICS

The Nobel Prize in Physics is one half jointly awarded to Syukuro Manabe, Klaus Hasselman, and the other half Giorgio Parisi.

Laureates Syukuro Manabe and Klaus Hasselman are awarded the Nobel Prize for their groundbreaking contributions to the physical model of the earth's climate to help predict global warming, and how humans influence it.

Laureate Giorgio Parisi is awarded the Nobel Prize for the groundbreaking discovery of the interplay of disorder in physical systems, revolutionizing the theory of disordered materials and random processes. Manabe, Hasselmann and Parisi. Ill. Niklas Elmehed © Nobel Prize Outreach.

Syukuro Manabe, born in 1931 in Shingu, Japan, demonstrated how increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could affect the surface temperature of the Earth. His work exploring the interaction between radiation and the vertical transportation of air masses laid the foundations for the development of current climate models. He is currently a Senior Meteorologist at Princeton University, USA.

Klaus Hasselmann, currently a Professor at Max Planck Institute for Meteorology in Hamburg, Germany, created a model to show how the weather and the climate are linked. He also developed methods for showing how nature and human activity impact the climate. His methods have been used to prove that the increased temperature in the atmosphere is due to human emissions of carbon dioxide.

Giorgio Parisi, Professor at Sapienza University of Rome, Italy, discovered in around 1980, hidden patterns in disordered complex materials making it possible to understand and describe different materials and phenomena.

Prize amount: 10 million Swedish kronor, with one half jointly to Syukuro Manabe and Klaus Hasselmann and the other half to Giorgio Parisi.

George Washington University researchers use Comsol Multiphysics software for simulating a nanophotonic analog processor

Tyler O'Neal, Staff Editor PHYSICS

Analog photonic solutions offer unique opportunities to address complex computational tasks with unprecedented performance in terms of energy dissipation and speeds, overcoming current limitations of modern computing architectures based on electron flows and digital approaches. 

In a new study published today in the journal Nature Communications Physics, researchers led by Volker Sorger, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at George Washington University, reveal a new nanophotonic analog processor capable of solving partial differential equations. This nanophotonic processor can be integrated at a chip-scale, processing arbitrary inputs at the speed of light.

 

Mario Miscuglio - Researchers at GW have developed a nanophotonic analog accelerator to solve challenging engineering and science problems, known as partial differential equations, in fractions of a second.