Objective "The requirements for the basic building blocks of Quantum Information Processing (QIP) are sometimes contradictory:one must seek components that are immune to interactions to preserve their fragile quantum properties, and, at the sametime, to have strong, controllable interactions to perform operations on the quantum information they carry.Different implementations using atomic, solid state or photonic systems have different strengths and weaknesses,so there has been a growing interest in the study of hybrid systems, that combine different technologies toimplement those basic building blocks. Photons are the best system to transfer quantum information, because they travel very fast (as fast as it is possible) and are virtually immune to losing their quantum properties; however, photon-photon interactions are very weak, and most materials only show nonlinearities at high photon numbers.Recently, it has been shown that Rydberg atoms can mediate strong, controllable interactions between individualphotons, thus being an ideal system for QIP tasks. ""Exploring Photon-photon Interactions using Cold Rydberg Atoms"" (EPICA) is a project aimed at exploring the effective photon-photon interactions mediated by Rydberg atoms. The aims of this project are three: – To combine Rydberg atoms with externally generated single-photons.– To describe in a fundamental way dipole-dipole interactions in the context of multiple storedphotons in a highly interacting medium (Rydberg atoms).– To apply this fundamental knowledge to implement basic building blocks for QuantumInformation Processing, such as two-photon gates, that could eventually work with single-photonsthat can be entangled; or others such as a Fock state discriminator or a Fock state emitter." Fields of science natural scienceschemical sciencesinorganic chemistryalkali metalsengineering and technologyelectrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineeringelectronic engineeringcomputer hardwarequantum computersnatural sciencesphysical sciencesopticslaser physicsnatural sciencesphysical sciencestheoretical physicsparticle physicsphotons Keywords Rydberg photon-photon interactions DLCZ Rydberg blockade Programme(s) H2020-EU.1.3. - EXCELLENT SCIENCE - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Main Programme H2020-EU.1.3.2. - Nurturing excellence by means of cross-border and cross-sector mobility Topic(s) MSCA-IF-2014-EF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF-EF) Call for proposal H2020-MSCA-IF-2014 See other projects for this call Funding Scheme MSCA-IF - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellowships (IF) Coordinator FUNDACIO INSTITUT DE CIENCIES FOTONIQUES Net EU contribution € 158 121,60 Address AVINGUDA CARL FRIEDRICH GAUSS 3 08860 Castelldefels Spain See on map Region Este Cataluña Barcelona Activity type Research Organisations Links Contact the organisation Opens in new window Website Opens in new window Participation in EU R&I programmes Opens in new window HORIZON collaboration network Opens in new window Total cost € 158 121,60
