| Project Detail |
Our vision is to revolutionize information and quantum technologies by blending photonic and electronic functionality onto a single chip. This long-standing challenge has remained unattainable because chips, fabricated by mainstream silicon technology, cannot emit light. Computer chips would be much faster and consume far less energy if they would operate with light. In addition, optical functionality will be transformative for quantum computation since silicon technologies are by far the most scalable allowing the connection of millions of quantum bits using light. We envision to realize light-emitting chips by changing the most fundamental property of a given material the way in which the atoms are arranged in space. Hereby, we explore a novel material, hexagonal SiGe, with an atomic arrangement that differs from the natural cubic material, rendering it optically active. We will understand light emission mechanisms in the classical and quantum regimes, when many, few and even single photons are generated on demand. Moreover, we will elucidate the optical and electrical properties of quantum structures, aiming for landmark experiments, each of which can open a new research field: i) a SiGe-based laser, which demonstrates the photonic potential of the material, and is a device directly relevant for optical communication on a chip, ii) a SiGe quantum light source, which uniquely combines the stability of the quantum state with optical functionality and iii) spin quantum bits that can be rapidly manipulated, upscaled and are long-lived due to the expected material properties. In the ultimate experiments, we connect the advantageous opto-electronic properties of this new material system and investigate i) active photonic circuits in which light is switched by light, and ii) the transduction of a static electronic quantum state (spin) into a propagating photonic state to connect distant qubits. |
