Two technical breakthroughs, from the realms of experimental physics and microscopic communities, have claimed top honors from WARF this year.
The 2019 WARF Innovation Award winners are: Mark Saffman (physics) and Ophelia Venturelli, Philip Romero and Ryan Hsu (biochemistry). Saffman has developed simplified optical hardware for quantum computing. His technology, recently licensed to ColdQuanta Inc., improves an apparatus for particle trapping, which will reduce the cost and complexity of next-generation quantum computing devices.
“We’re trying to push the envelope on how much computation we can do with a quantum computer,” said Saffman. “We currently have more than 100 quantum bits…that’s the largest number of quantum bits any lab in the world has been able to demonstrate to date.”