21.5 million euro for QuMAT: Materials for the Quantum Age

The Ministry of Education, Culture and Science has awarded seven consortia a total of 142 million euros in the context of the Dutch Gravity research program. 21.5 million euro of that goes to the consortium QuMAT: Materials for the Quantum Age. Prof. Bart van Wees of the Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials (Faculty of Science and Engineering, UG) is one of the main investigators.

Qumat is led by Prof. Daniel Vanmaekelbergh of Utrecht University. In addition to the University of Groningen (UG), Radboud University Nijmegen, TU Delft and TU Eindhoven are also participating in the consortium.

More powerful computers

There is a rapidly increasing demand for more powerful computers. It is expected that information processing – via your computer, your telephone or in data centers – will account for 30% of the worldwide electrical energy consumption by 2030. The QuMAT consortium wants to develop new materials with stable quantum states. With these new materials, computing and current ways of information processing will become much more powerful and at the same time more energy-efficient. Moreover, stable quantum states that remain coherent under affordable conditions will allow for the scaling of powerful quantum computers.

Groningen participants

From the Zernike Institute for Advanced Materials at the Faculty of Science and Engineering - University of Groningen, Bart van Wees, Caspar van der Wal, Jagoda Slawinska, Marcos H.D. Guimarães, Justin Ye, and Petra Rudolf participate in the program.

More information

• NWO news release
• Contact in Groningen: Prof. ir. B.J. van Wees