Nick Spong (NQCC)
Neutral Atom Quantum Computing: Progress, Challenges & UK National Labs
Within the UK and beyond, resource is being devoted to quantum research and industry [1], with many regions now operating national centres of quantum (computing) excellence or initiatives [2]. The UK government has recently declared a national mission [3] to bring devices capable of delivering a trillion coherent quantum operations into existence. In this rapidly evolving landscape, NQCC seeks to provide trusted advice into government on quantum computing through standing capability and ongoing projects which span innovation, user engagement and research [4]. In this role, NQCC maintains six research teams on experimental superconducting, ionic and neutral atom quantum computing as well as applications, software and HPC integration themes.
Over the past ten years, since early claims of quantum supremacy [5,6] much progress has been witnessed across all platforms, with the ultimate aim of creating a fault-tolerant quantum computer [7]. These efforts have led to some of the most impressive experimental demonstrations of quantum control, including and high-fidelity entanglement, error correction, and universal gate operations across several platforms. Whilst each platform has is advantages, neutral atom quantum computers are a strong contender for realising quantum advantage, both through analog quantum simulation [8] and fault-tolerant digital quantum computation [9]. These platforms use excitations of atoms trapped in optical dipole traps as natural qubits, with interactions mediated via Rydberg blockade. This platform brings many advantages including near term scalability to ~10,000 qubits, reconfigurable qubit connectivity and scalable addressing schemes. These advantages have led commercial neutral atom quantum computing companies to claim that quantum computers with hundreds of logical qubits could be here as soon as next year [10]!
This talk will discuss recent progress in quantum computing, with a focus on progress and challenges for the neutral atom platform. It will outline recent progress & future direction of the newly established NQCC neutral atom quantum computing team and discuss benefits to the UK neutral atom quantum computing ecosystem of experimental quantum computing within national labs.
[1] e.g. (recent): PsiQuantum Raises $1 Billion to Build Million-Qubit Scale, Fault-Tolerant Quantum Computers, QuEra Completes $230 M Financing
| [2] Homepage of Quantum Flagship | Quantum Flagship, Energy Department Announces $625 Million to Advance the Next Phase of National Quantum Information Science Research Centers | Department of Energy |
[3] National Quantum Strategy Missions - GOV.UK
[4] National Quantum Computing Centre - NQCC
| [5] Quantum supremacy using a programmable superconducting processor | Nature |
| [6] Quantum computational advantage using photons | Science |
[7] [quant-ph/9712048] Fault-tolerant quantum computation
[8] Quantum Computing in the NISQ era and beyond
[9] [2510.19928] Mind the gaps: The fraught road to quantum advantage
[10] Roadmap for Advanced Error-Corrected Quantum Computers