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Latest News and Research

Ring resonators corner light

Researchers at the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI) have created the first silicon chip that can reliably constrain light to its four corners. The effect, which arises from interfering optical pathways, isn't altered by small defects during fabrication and could eventually enable the creation of robust sources of quantum light.That robustness is due to topological physics, which describes the properties of materials that are insensitive to small changes in geometry. The cornering of light, which was reported June 17 in Nature Photonics, is a realization of a new topological effect, first predicted in 2017. Continue Reading
Gorshkov student, Kevin Qian, wins 2nd place in prestigious international science fair

Kevin Qian of Montgomery Blair High School placed 2nd in the Physics and Astronomy category at the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) 2019 with his research topic “Heisenberg-Scaling Measurement Protocol for Analytic Functions with Quantum Sensor Networks.” Qian worked with Adjunct Associate Professor Alexey Gorshkov and graduate student researcher Zachary Eldredge in the University of Maryland Department of Physics, the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI), and the Joint Center for Quantum Information and Computer Science (QuICS). Continue Reading
JQI Fellow Hafezi Named Finalist for Blavatnik Award

JQI Fellow Mohammad Hafezi has been named a finalist for the 2019 Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists.He is one of 31 researchers competing for three Blavatnik National Laureate Awards in the categories of Physical Sciences and Engineering, Chemistry and Life Sciences, and is one of 10 finalists in Physical Sciences and Engineering. Each of the three National Laureates will win $250,000—the world’s largest unrestricted prize for early-career scientists. The awards are sponsored by the Blavatnik Family Foundation and the New York Academy of Sciences.... Continue Reading
New Simons Collaboration on "Ultra-Quantum Matter" spans 12 institutions, including UMD
A team of theoretical physicists will investigate quantum physics on macroscopic scales.

Seventeen theoretical physics faculty across 12 institutions have established a new Simons Collaboration on Ultra-Quantum Matter. The team, which includes Victor Galitski, a Chesapeake Chair Professor of Theoretical Physics in the Department of Physics and Fellow of the Joint Quantum Institute, will investigate innovative ideas about how quantum physics works on macroscopic scales. This new effort will be led by Professor Ashvin Vishwanath at Harvard University and is supported under the Simons Collaborations in Mathematics and Physical Sciences program, which aims to “stimulate progress on fundamental scientific questions of major importance in mathematics, theoretical physics and theoretical computer science."... Continue Reading
High-resolution imaging technique maps out an atomic wave function
Overlapping laser beams offer a new way to extract a quantum system’s essential information.

From NIST NewsJQI researchers have demonstrated a new way to obtain the essential details that describe an isolated quantum system, such as a gas of atoms, through direct observation. The new method gives information about the likelihood of finding atoms at specific locations in the system with unprecedented spatial resolution. With this technique, scientists can obtain details on a scale of tens of nanometers—smaller than the width of a virus.The new experiments use an optical lattice—a web of laser light that suspends thousands of individual atoms—to determine the probability that an atom might be at any given location. Because each individual... Continue Reading
JQI Fellow Manucharyan receives Google Faculty Research Award

Google AI recently announced that JQI Fellow Vlad Manucharyan is among the recipients for this year's Google Faculty Research Awards. The program supports technical research in areas such as machine learning and quantum computing, the latter of which is Manucharyan's area of specialty. In the 2018 awards cycle the program funded 158 of the 910 proposed projects. Manucharyan, who is also the Alford Ward Professor of Physics at UMD, is a leading condensed matter experimentalist who uses superconducting circuits to make quantum bits, which underlie of one type of quantum computer. This type of research is also an active area of... Continue Reading
Glass fibers and light offer new control over atomic fluorescence

Electrons inside an atom whip around the nucleus like satellites around the Earth, occupying orbits determined by quantum physics. Light can boost an electron to a different, more energetic orbit, but that high doesn’t last forever. At some point the excited electron will relax back to its original orbit, causing the atom to spontaneously emit light that scientists call fluorescence.   Scientists can play tricks with an atom’s surroundings to tweak the relaxation time for high-flying electrons, which then dictates the rate of fluorescence. In a new study, researchers at the Joint Quantum Institute observed that a tiny thread of glass, called an... Continue Reading
Cold atoms offer a glimpse of flat physics

These days, movies and video games render increasingly realistic 3-D images on 2-D screens, giving viewers the illusion of gazing into another world. For many physicists, though, keeping things flat is far more interesting.One reason is that flat landscapes can unlock new movement patterns in the quantum world of atoms and electrons. For instance, shedding the third dimension enables an entirely new class of particles to emerge—particles that that don’t fit neatly into the two classes, bosons and fermions, provided by nature. These new particles, known as anyons, change in novel ways when they swap places, a feat that could... Continue Reading
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Latest News and Research

  • Ring resonators corner light

    Researchers at the Joint Quantum Institute (JQI) have created the first silicon chip that can reliably constrain light to its four corners. The effect, which arises from interfering optical pathways, isn't altered by small defects during fabrication and could eventually enable the creation of robust sources of quantum light.That robustness is due to topological physics, which describes the... Continue Reading
  • Gorshkov student, Kevin Qian, wins 2nd place in prestigious international science fair

    Kevin Qian of Montgomery Blair High School placed 2nd in the Physics and Astronomy category at the International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) 2019 with his research topic “Heisenberg-Scaling Measurement Protocol for Analytic Functions with... Continue Reading
  • JQI Fellow Hafezi Named Finalist for Blavatnik Award

    JQI Fellow Mohammad Hafezi has been named a finalist for the 2019 Blavatnik National Awards for Young Scientists.He is one of 31 researchers competing for three Blavatnik National Laureate Awards in the categories of Physical Sciences and Engineering, Chemistry and Life Sciences, and is one of 10 finalists in... Continue Reading
  • New Simons Collaboration on "Ultra-Quantum Matter" spans 12 institutions, including UMD
    A team of theoretical physicists will investigate quantum physics on macroscopic scales.

    Seventeen theoretical physics faculty across 12 institutions have established a new Simons Collaboration on Ultra-Quantum Matter. The team, which includes Victor Galitski, a Chesapeake Chair Professor of Theoretical Physics in the Department of Physics and Fellow of the Joint Quantum Institute, will... Continue Reading
  • High-resolution imaging technique maps out an atomic wave function
    Overlapping laser beams offer a new way to extract a quantum system’s essential information.

    From NIST NewsJQI researchers have demonstrated a new way to obtain the essential details that describe an isolated quantum system, such as a gas of atoms, through direct observation. The new method gives information about the likelihood of finding atoms at specific locations in the system with unprecedented spatial resolution. With this technique, scientists can obtain... Continue Reading
  • JQI Fellow Manucharyan receives Google Faculty Research Award

    Google AI recently announced that JQI Fellow Vlad Manucharyan is among the recipients for this year's Google Faculty Research Awards. The program supports technical research in areas such as machine learning and quantum computing, the latter of which is Manucharyan's area of specialty. In the 2018 awards... Continue Reading
  • Glass fibers and light offer new control over atomic fluorescence

    Electrons inside an atom whip around the nucleus like satellites around the Earth, occupying orbits determined by quantum physics. Light can boost an electron to a different, more energetic orbit, but that high doesn’t last forever. At some point the excited electron will relax back to its original orbit, causing the atom to spontaneously emit light that scientists call fluorescence.   ... Continue Reading
  • Cold atoms offer a glimpse of flat physics

    These days, movies and video games render increasingly realistic 3-D images on 2-D screens, giving viewers the illusion of gazing into another world. For many physicists, though, keeping things flat is far more interesting.One reason is that flat landscapes can unlock new movement patterns in the quantum world of atoms and electrons. For instance, shedding the third dimension enables an... Continue Reading
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Recent Publications

"Theory of Bose condensation of light via laser cooling of atoms," C.H. Wang, M.J. Gullans, J.V. Porto, W.D. Phillips, J.M. Taylor, Phys. Rev. A, 031801, 99 (2019)
"Machine learning techniques for state recognition and auto-tuning in quantum dots," S.S. Kalantre, J.P. Zwolak, S. Ragole, X. Wu, N.M. Zimmerman, , J.M. Taylor, NPJ QUANTUM INFORMATION, 6, 5 (2019)
"Alignment-dependent decay rate of an atomic dipole near an optical nanofiber," P. Solano, J.A. Grover, Y. Xu, P. Barberis-Blostein, J.N. Munday, L.A. Orozco, W.D. Phillips, S.L. Rolston, Phys. Rev. A, 013822, 99 (2019)
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