Quantum ResearchThe Quantum Detection group at NPL use a broad range of technology, much of it at the nanometre scale, to explore physical phenomenon for electrical metrology, magnetic sensing and communications.
Quantum Detection Research Areas
- Measurements and visualisation of small magnetic fields/moments.
- Nanoscale superconducting quantum interference devices.
- Nano-scale devices that move electrons one at a time.
- Technology to facilitate quantum optical processes and algorithms.
- A synthesizer for waveforms directly in terms of the Josephson effect.
- Investigating sources of decoherence in quantum systems.
Previous Research Areas
- NPL scientists and their collaborators develop ultra-sensitive terahertz detectors, methods and instrumentation for their calibration.
- The AFM-based technique developed at NPL has enabled the intrinsic electrical conductance of N-doped NTs to be measured for the first time. These measurements are important for the development of N-doped NT biosensor devices.
- When the size of a conductor becomes comparable to the distance a particle inside it travels before scattering, ballistic effects occur, where classical relations such as Ohm's law no longer apply.
- At NPL we develop methods, instrumentation and magnetic artefacts for quantitative measurements of magnetic parameters and phenomena in nanoscale systems.
- A new commercial SQUID magnetometer is used to measure magnetic properties of a wide range of magnetic materials such as conventional ferromagnets, diluted magnetic semiconductors, functional oxides multiferroics, molecular magnets, etc.
- Superconductivity is one of most fascinating manifestation of quantum effects on macroscopic scales, when at a certain low temperature a huge ensemble of electrons spontaneously forms a single whole called superconducting condensate described by a common wavefunction.