Silicon is the best-known semiconductor material. However, controlled nanostructuring drastically alters the material's properties. Using a specially developed etching apparatus, a team at HZB has now produced mesoporous silicon layers with countless tiny pores and investigated their electrical and thermal conductivity. For the first time, the researchers elucidated the electronic transport mechanism in this mesoporous silicon. The material has great potential for applications and could also be used to thermally insulate qubits for quantum computers.

Demcon has partnered with TNO and the University of Twente to accelerate low-energy modulation of silicon nitride (SiN) photonic chips. These advanced photonic chips promise to create cheaper, faster, and more energy-efficient devices, enabling earlier disease diagnostics, safe self-driving vehicles, and more efficient data communication. By combining their expertise, Demcon, University of Twente and TNO are set to drive significant advancements in photonic chip technology. The research is partly funded by the National Growth Fund project PhotonDelta.

Researchers from Case Western Reserve University and the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have now discovered another interesting property in diamonds with added boron, known as boron-doped diamonds. Their findings could pave the way for new types of biomedical and quantum optical devices—faster, more efficient, and capable of processing information in ways that classical technologies cannot. Their results are published recently in Nature Communications.

Classiq, a leading quantum computing software company, and Florence Quantum Labs today announced their collaboration on research to develop quantum-enhanced precision agriculture. This announcement comes as 2025 kicks off the International Year of Quantum Science and Technologies, underscoring the global significance of quantum advancements in addressing critical challenges.

Physics Professor Wolfgang Losert, Cell Biology and Molecular Genetics Professor Kan Cao, Chemistry and Biochemistry Professor John Fourkas, and Electrical and Computer Engineering Associate Professor Cheng Gong were awarded $2 million by the U.S. Air Force Office of Scientific Research to build a test bed to study how neural networks process information and develop new approaches to quantum computing and sensing inspired by the living brain. As principal investigator of this multidisciplinary and cross-institutional project, Losert will collaborate with both UMD faculty members as well as other academic and industry partners to better understand and recreate the brain’s unique capacity for learning and adapting quickly—abilities that far surpass traditional computer systems.

Researchers have discovered a way to recycle the tiny particles used to create supraparticle lasers, a technology that precisely controls light at a very small scale. Supraparticle lasers work by trapping light inside a tiny sphere made of special particles called quantum dots, which can absorb, emit, and amplify light very efficiently.

In a new paper published in Physical Review Research, Tohoku University's Dr. Le Bin Ho explores the effectiveness of the squeezing technique in enhancing the precision of measurements in quantum systems with multiple factors. The analysis provides theoretical and numerical insights, aiding in the identification of mechanisms for achieving maximum precision in these intricate measurements.

Researchers from TMOS, the ARC Centre of Excellence for Transformative Meta-Optical Systems, have developed a new engineering approach to on-chip light sources that could lead to widespread adoption of photonic chips in consumer electronics.