RII Track-4: NSF: Fabrication of Inversely Designed Nanophotonic Structures for Quantum Emitters

This Research Infrastructure Improvement Track-4 EPSCoR Research Fellows project will provide a fellowship to an Associate Professor and training for a graduate student at West Virginia University (WVU). This work will be conducted in collaboration with researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST). The fellowship will support extended visits by the PI and a graduate student trainee to NIST in Gaithersburg, MD to acquire the expertise required for electron-beam lithography and the fabrication of nanoscopic light-guiding structures.

These nanophotonic structures will enhance the PI's existing program of investigations into the properties of quantum-confined solid-state systems known as quantum dots. Nanophotonic structures containing quantum dots will enable the study of fundamental quantum light-matter interactions and potentially lead to the production of entangled photons in a photonic integrated circuit.

The experience gained during the fellowship will have a long-lasting impact on the scientific productivity of the PI's research group and will enable students at WVU to fully utilize NIST's fabrication facilities in the future. The successful completion of the proposed research will result in a device with the potential to transform photonic quantum computation and kickstart a program at WVU focused on investigating the fundamental physics of quantum photonic devices.

Funding will also support undergraduate students in the WVU Quantum Technology club in taking the certification exam for Qiskit, a quantum computing software development package. This will increase the recruitment of WVU students for career positions in quantum information science.

The research vision of the project is to develop an all-on-chip nanophotonic device containing a semiconductor quantum dot that produces on-demand, path-entangled photon pairs for the purpose of photonic quantum information processing. The career development vision is to provide the PI with the expertise to plan and perform the fabrication of nanophotonic structures around quantum dots.

The fellowship will support two 3-month summer visits by the PI and a graduate student trainee to learn electron-beam lithography and the associated ancillary cleanroom skills in the NanoFab at NIST. Completion of the proposed research will not only yield a device with the potential to revolutionize photonic quantum computation but will also kickstart a program at WVU aimed at investigating the fundamental physics of quantum photonic devices.

Pursuing research to realize photonic quantum computation is crucial because it can achieve universal quantum computation. One essential component is a source of photons entangled in some degree of freedom. The proposed research project is significant because it will enable the emission of path-entangled photon pairs into on-chip waveguides.

This is highly desirable, as it would allow quantum state manipulation and measurement in compact, stable, and potentially fast photonic integrated circuits. The advantages of this entangled light source would be valuable for boson sampling experiments, discrete-time quantum walks for universal quantum computation, and other linear optical quantum computation protocols.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.