Chase Research Cryogenics have recently completed a project funded by Innovate UK to demonstrate the feasibility of cooling a quantum processor with a low-cost, low-power, compact and mobile cryogenics platform. Extending CRC’s current cooling technology to millikelvin temperatures is a significant technical challenge. Our project brings together a unique team that includes the UK’s world-leading low temperature research groups at Cardiff University, Lancaster University and Royal Holloway University of London. Our final project partner, SeeQC.UK, provides the commercial superconducting quantum technology for testing the capabilities of our cryogenics platform, and of course vital system-user input to specification and performance requirements.
Access to milliKelvin temperatures has until now relied on large research-scale cryogenic platforms that typically occupy several tens of square meters of floorspace and require either Helium liquefaction plant or high-power 3-phase electricity and water cooling. These cost and infrastructure requirements are significant barriers to the marketisation of quantum computing technologies. We aim to demonstrate that we can provide a cryogenic platform for superconducting qubits in a compact, mobile format that requires only single-phase domestic electrical supply. All of the necessary technological solutions are, in principle, already available but they have never before been integrated together into a low-cost cooling platform designed for quantum computing applications. By dramatically cutting both the capital and operational cost of quantum computing, this development would hugely accelerate its deployment in a wide range of settings.
In the coming months we hope to present results from this project at several scientific conferences. Look out for us at the following events:
25 to 29 April 2022: International Cryogenic Engineering Conference Website: http://www.icec28-icmc2022.com/ China
21 to 23 June 2022: Quantum 2022 Barcelona Spain https://www.quantumconf.eu/2022/index.php
18-24 August 2022: 29th International conference on low temperature physics http://www.lt29.jp/ Sapporo
