On April 16th, over 100 graduate students, undergraduate students, postdoctoral researchers, staff, research scientists, and PIs attended the first JILA Association of Graduate Students (JAGS) Industry Spotlight.
This event featured a technical talk and networking with Quantinuum, a quantum computing company with a Boulder location and a major employer of JILA alumni. The seminar’s record-breaking attendance reflected both the excitement at JILA, NIST, and the University of Colorado Boulder about Boulder’s growing quantum industry hub and the large body of research at CU that overlaps with Quantinuum’s technology.
Thanmay Menon, a member of JAGS leadership, hopes that this event series “will help JILA strengthen its connection to the thriving quantum industry here at Colorado while investing in the long-term success of its graduates.”
Three Quantinuum employees, and also former JILAns, gave technical presentations on the company’s history, recent work, and future goals. Dr. John Gaebler, the Chief Scientist of Commercial Products, gave the technical presentation, starting with a timeline of the advances in the field of quantum charge-coupled devices (QCCD). The technical seminar focused on the systems Quantinuum has released, including their newest quantum computing system, the System Model H2, which folds the computing architecture into a ring shape to enable it to contain 52 fully connected ytterbium-171 qubits, a record for trapped-ion computing.
Dr. Stephen Erickson, the R&D Manager, and Dr. Russel Stutz, the Senior Director of Product Technologies, participated in the seminar’s Q&A and the informal networking session afterward. During the Q&A, the speakers discussed the technical details of QCCD systems and the future of the field.
After the conclusion of the seminar, the speakers and attendees continued their discussions in the JILA h-Bar during an informal networking session with snacks and sodas. Attendees talked to Quantinuum representatives for over an hour, asking more specific questions about many different aspects of the technology that Gaebler presented on, with many eager to figure out how their current research fits in with Quantinuum’s innovative technology.
Ben Hunt, a CU Boulder graduate student working at NIST, stayed until the event's end and thought it “offered an extremely valuable opportunity to get an in-depth look at the work being done in the Boulder quantum ecosystem and to connect CU students with industry members.”
As JILA alumni, the speakers also enjoyed the opportunity to reconnect with former labmates and mentors from JILA and NIST.
This event is the first of many Industry Spotlight seminars hosted by JAGS featuring local companies.
“[We’re] hopeful this [will be] the start of a closer relationship with Quantinuum and other local companies,” said Keegan Finger, one of the event organizers and a member of JAGS leadership.
JAGS’s goal of the Industry Spotlight event series is to foster connections between JILA, Physics, NIST, and Engineering and the local quantum, optics, and photonics ecosystem. In addition to their participation in the Industry Spotlight, Quantinuum made a generous donation to support JAGS's initiatives to build a stronger community of students and researchers across Boulder.
The inaugural seminar had a significant impact on its attendees, particularly the graduate students, with JILA graduate student Iona Binnie mentioning that “[The seminar was a] really fantastic idea for an event and I hope we can do more like that in the future.”
Written by Emma Nelson and the JAGS leadership.