The work of the group as a whole is recognised with Martin’s inclusion on the list of highly cited researchers which recognises the approximately top 0.1% of researchers worldwide that have published a significant number of highly cited research articles.
We are always keen to present our research to the general public.
Enjoy radio shows on our work on the local Radio Free FM and the national Deutschlandfunk.
Ludovico will use his Humboldt fellowship to explore the properties of quantum resource theories and other mathematical aspects of quantum information theory thus greatly strengthening the quantum information arm of the group.
After 2017 and 2018 this is the third time Martin has been selected. A great recognition for the entire group that has contributed to this success with its great work over the last years!
Great success for the Institute of Theoretical Physics. In a team with Fedor Jelezko at Ulm and Jan Ardenkjaer-Larsen at the Technical University of Denmark, Martin Plenio wins the ERC Synergy grant HyperQ – Quantum hyperpolarisation for ultrasensitive nuclear magnetic resonance and imaging. This project will allow us to continue our exciting work on diamond based hyperpolarisation that was started with the theory proposal in our group [1] and the first experiments in Fedor Jelezko’s group [2]. We arejoined by Jan Ardenkjaer-Larsen who has pioneered dissolution DNP and as a team we hope to develop this technology to bring it to applications.
[1] J.M. Cai, A. Retzker, F. Jelezko and M.B. Plenio. A large-scale quantum simulator on a
diamond surface at room temperature. Nature Physics 9, 168 -173 (2013) and E-print arXiv:1208.2874
[2] P. London, J. Scheuer, J.M. Cai, I. Schwarz, A. Retzker, M.B. Plenio, M. Katagiri, T. Teraji, S. Koizumi, J. Isoya, R. Fischer, L.P. McGuinness, B. Naydenov and F. Jelezko. Detecting and polarizing nuclear spins with nuclear double resonance on a single electron spin. Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 067601 (2013) and E-print arXiv:1304.4709
Congratulations, Zhenyu, on the birth of Qian-Qian!
We wish you and your family all the best!
Julen Pedernales wins the best poster award at the Bad Honnef seminar on Levitated Optomechanics
https://www.we-heraeus-stiftung.de/veranstaltungen/seminare/2019/levitated-optomechanics/
Ish wins a well-deserved “Forschungsbonus”, an award of the Ulm University for excellence in research, to recognize his work on tensor networks and their application to the modelling of system-environment dynamics and quantum simulation as well as his successful cooperation with experiment.
Well done, Ish!
A great recognition for the entire group that has contributed to this success with its great work over the last years!
Congratulations, Joachim, to the birth of your baby!
We wish you and your family all the best!
Last week we had our 4th summer BBQ!
Thank you everyone for the nice company and the delicious international food!
Looking forward to next summer
Once again, for the third year in a row, the Institute has celebrated the ITP Table Tennis Tournament.
Trough the month of June our lives have been enlightened with breathtaking ping pong matches that most probably we will never forget.
This year the Podium has been occupied by the crème de la crème of our Table Tennis players, and we are speaking of a worldwide level.
So we want to thank and congratulate Ish, Myung-Joong and Dario for their incredible performance, but also we would like to extend our gratitude to all the other players that have given us incredible emotions.
#WannaPlay
Congratulations, Ewa, to the birth of your daughter, Helena Maria!
We wish you and your family all te best!
QuantumFutur Award finalists (including our own Benedikt) presented their work to the QuantumFutur Academy participants in a poster session and Benedikt’s poster talk was chosen as the best presentation!
Way to go!
Here is the link to the press release and here is the link to the Poster.
IQST’s Quantum Science Slam took place on February 8th at the Theaterhaus Stuttgart:
7 amazing performances, a fully packed hall and great fun. The audience have voted:
1st winner: Lukas Kürten from the Max Planck Institute FKF
2nd winners, jointly: Sven Bodenstedt from University of Stuttgart and Korbinian from our group! Well done!
Here is a photo collage of the event:
As one of only two theoretical physicist in Germany, Martin is listed in the annual compilation of the worlds most cited and influential scientists. We are delighted with this award which recognizes the excellent work of the entire group over the last decade.
The listing can be found here.
In 2010 we proposed theoretically a new method for efficient quantum state tomography for large quantum systems. In a joint project with the trapped ion group at Innsbruck we have achieved the first experimental demonstration of this method. The project started in 2013 required the sustained effort of two generations of PhD students (Tillmann & Milan) and postdocs (Ish & Marcus). Well done!
Our recent article “Resource Theory of Superposition,” by T. Theurer, N. Killoran, D. Egloff, and M. B. Plenio, has been highlighted as an Editor’s Suggestion in the most recent volume of Physical Review Letters.
The article can be found here.
Congratulations, Jorge, to the birth of your daughter, Alejandra!
We hope you have a joyful and healthy journey ahead and we are looking forward to Alejandra’s first visit to the institute!
Recently, Ilai and Martin, in a collaboration with Liam McGuinness and Fedor Jelezko and their team, published their work in Science. In a joint theoretical and experimental work NMR signals of nanoscale samples were measured in a setup that is capable, in principle, of resolving chemical shifts and J-coupling which are essential quantities to identify molecules or determine their structure.
Click here to view the article
Our work on the role of the interplay of quantum dynamics and the environment, notably vibronic coupling, is reported upon in a science special in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung, a leading German weekly. It also explains our recent collaboration with the Christoph Lienau to show that vibronic coupling that we introduced to quantum biology is also active in organic photovoltaics.
Click here to view the article
ITP and the Center of QuantumBioSciences is part of newly approved Collaborative Research Center 1279 on “Exploiting the Human Peptidome for Novel Antimicrobial and Anticancer Agents”. Our team contributes to the CRC with a project on hyperpolarized nanodiamond as contrast agents for cancer research. Funded initially for a period of 4 years the CRC may be extended for a duration of up to 12 years.
The work of the Institute on hyperpolarized magnetic resonance imaging was mentioned in a recent special on quantum technologies by The Economist: http://www.economist.com/node/21718308?frsc=dg%7Cc .
In our work, Ilai, Qiong, Benedikt, Pelayo, Janica and Martin are collaborating closely with our friends from the Institute of Quantum Optics to use diamond quantum technologies to create very strong nuclear spin polarization in nanoscale diamonds as well as metabolic molecules outside of the diamond substrate. As the signal in a magnetic resonance scanner is proportional to the polarization of the target, this has the potential to strongly enhance the imaging capabilities of MRI. Our dream is to use these ideas to revolutionize cancer imaging and hence improve its detection as well the assessment of treatment success. Supported by the EU Project HYPERDIAMOND we have made encouraging progress, but we want to go further. With our start-up NVision Imaging Technologies we are pursuing the translation of this quantum technology to the real world !
Jorge Casanova wins a “Forschungsbonus”, https://www.uni-ulm.de/in/fakultaet/in-detailseiten/news-detail/article/forschungs-und-lehrboni-vergeben-psychotrauma-quanten-und-stochastik-forscher-sowie-innovative/, an award of the Ulm University for excellence in research, to recognize his work on the control of electron and nuclear spins in diamonds and trapped ions.
Well done Jorge !
We are proud that our group has two articles in the first issue ever of the new journal ‘Quantum Science and Technology’:
Coherent control of quantum systems as a resource theory
J.M. Matera, D. Egloff, N. Killoran, and M.B. Plenio
Quantum Sci. Technol. 1, 01LT01 (2016)|ArXiv
While controlling a quantum system is a standard task nowadays, we are still far away from developing quantum computers, and one might wonder what is the difference between the two. Qualitatively the difference is that for quantum computing one needs to control quantum systems in a quantum way, using quantum systems instead of directly using the large apparata or (classical) electromagnetical fields that often are enough to control a quantum system directly. In this letter we make this idea precise by building a theory which allows us to quantify the usefulness of controlling a quantum system through a quantum system instead of using a classical one.
Realising a quantum absorption refrigerator with an atom-cavity system
M. Mitchison, M. Huber, J. Prior, M.P. Woods and M.B. Plenio
Quantum Sci. Technol. 1, 015001 (2016)|ArXiv
licensed under CC BY 3.0
Cooling of atomic motion is an essential precursor for many interesting experiments and technologies, such as quantum computing and simulation using trapped atoms and ions. In most cases, this cooling is performed using lasers to create a kind of light-induced friction force which slows the atoms down. This process is often rather wasteful, because lasers use up a huge amount of energy relative to the tiny size of the atoms we want to cool. Here, we propose to solve this problem using a quantum absorption refrigerator: a machine that is powered only by readily available thermal energy, such as sunlight, as it flows through the device. We describe how to build such a refrigerator, and predict that sunlight could actually be used to cool an atom to nearly absolute zero temperature. The refrigerator works by trapping the sunlight between two mirrors, in such a way that every single photon makes a significant contribution to the friction force slowing the atom down. Similar schemes could eventually be important for reducing the energy cost of cooling in future quantum technologies.
Julen Pedernales did it again, Best Post Prize at the UniKORN Poster Session 2021
Martin Plenio is listed as highly cited researcher for the fourth time in a row.
Our work on Quantum Physics and Biology featured Local and National Radio
Ludovico Lami wins a Humboldt Fellowship to continue his work in our group for another 2 years
Enhancing Gravitational Interaction between Quantum Systems by a Massive Mediator, Phys. Rev. Lett. 128, 110401 (2022)
Optimizing quantum codes with an application to the loss channel with partial erasure information, Quantum 6, 667 (2022)
On the Significance of Interferometric Revivals for the Fundamental Description of Gravity, Universe, 8, 58 (2022)
Design Principles for Long-Range Energy Transfer at Room Temperature, Phys. Rev. X 11, 041003
Ulm University
Institute of Theoretical Physics
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Office: Building M26, room 4117
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