Quantum computing: Photon startup lights up the future of computers and cryptography
A fast-growing UK startup is quietly making strides in the promising field of quantum photonics. Cambridge-based company Nu Quantum is building devices that can emit and detect quantum particles of light, called single photons. With a freshly secured £2.1 million ($2.71 million) seed investment, these devices could one day underpin sophisticated quantum photonic systems, for applications ranging from quantum communications to quantum computing.
The company is developing high-performance light-emitting and light-detecting components, which operate at the single-photon level and at ambient temperature, and is building a business based on the combination of quantum optics, semiconductor photonics, and information theory, spun out of the University of Cambridge after eight years of research at the Cavendish Laboratory.
“Any quantum photonic system will start with a source of single photons, and end with a detector of single photons,” Carmen Palacios-Berraquero, the CEO of Nu Quantum, tells ZDNet. “These technologies are different things, but
