Uploaded August 2022 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
Ideas@theHouse: August 2022 — recorded at Government House Sydney on 4 August 2022
"Manufacturing at the Atomic Scale"
Michelle Simmons AO FRS DistFRSN FAA FTSE
Scientia Professor, UNSW Sydney
Director, ARC Centre of Excellence (CQC2T)
Founder, Silicon Quantum Computing
https://royalsoc.org.au/blog/ideas-thehouse-august-2022
Timing Marks
00:00 Introduction: Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC QC, Governor of New South Wales
09:28 "Manufacturing at the Atomic Scale": Professor Michelle Simmons
28:59 Conversation and Vote of Thanks: Dr Susan Pond AM FRSN FTSE FAHMS, President Royal Society of NSW, and Professor Michelle Simmons
Summary
Figuring out how to build a quantum computer is one of the great challenges of our time. A quantum computer will bring solutions to a series of high-value computational tasks that remain beyond the reach of classical machines. Such tasks address a growing number of industry use cases in optimisation, machine learning, simulation and cryptography across the logistics, mining, pharmaceutical, finance, agricultural, automotive, communications and defence industries.
However, creating such a device requires exquisite control of computing components at unimaginably small length scales, where enigmatic quantum behaviour dominates. In this talk, I describe that whilst this is enormously challenging and, at the edge of human endeavour, I do not think it impossible. I will describe how we have pioneered a globally unique technology to build electronic devices with atomic precision and how we are now using this capability to design and manufacture atomic-scale components into the circuitry of a quantum computer. I will show the world’s first atomically manufactured integrated circuit and discuss how we have used this to perform an analogue quantum simulation of the organic molecule polyacetylene. From this, I will map the path to a commercially useful quantum processor.
About the Presenter
Michelle Simmons AO FRS DistFRSN, Scientia Professor at UNSW Sydney, Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence in Quantum Computing and Communications Technology, and Founder of Silicon Quantum Computing, has pioneered unique technologies to build electronic devices at the atomic scale, pushing the boundaries of global research in classical computing, and opening up the prospect of developing a silicon-based quantum computer: a powerful new form of computing with the potential to transform information processing. Her achievements include the development of the world's smallest transistor, the narrowest conducting wires, 3D atomic electronics, and the first two-qubit gate using atom-based qubits in silicon. Most recently, in June 2022, the start-up company SQC, of which she is the founder and director, announced the world's first integrated circuit at the atomic scale, comprising 10 quantum dots, that created a quantum integrated circuit capable of simulating molecular behaviour.
About Ideas@theHouse
In late 2019, Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC QC, Governor of New South Wales and Patron of the Royal Society of NSW invited representatives of the Society to discuss how the Governor might open Government House to a series of public events based on important and/or influential ideas. Her Excellency’s proposal was that the Royal Society of NSW might devise a series of presentations and lectures, to be held at Government House, and known as Ideas@theHouse, on topics of our choice for an invited audience of our Members and Fellows, together with others to be invited by Her Excellency. This is the fifth in the Ideas@theHouse series but only the second to be held at “The House” — with the other three having to be held online in May 2020, April 2021, and July 2021 due to restrictions associated with the pandemic at the time.
Ideas@theHouse: August 2022 — recorded at Government House Sydney on 4 August 2022
"Manufacturing at the Atomic Scale"
Michelle Simmons AO FRS DistFRSN FAA FTSE
Scientia Professor, UNSW Sydney
Director, ARC Centre of Excellence (CQC2T)
Founder, Silicon Quantum Computing
https://royalsoc.org.au/blog/ideas-thehouse-august-2022
Timing Marks
00:00 Introduction: Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC QC, Governor of New South Wales
09:28 "Manufacturing at the Atomic Scale": Professor Michelle Simmons
28:59 Conversation and Vote of Thanks: Dr Susan Pond AM FRSN FTSE FAHMS, President Royal Society of NSW, and Professor Michelle Simmons
Summary
Figuring out how to build a quantum computer is one of the great challenges of our time. A quantum computer will bring solutions to a series of high-value computational tasks that remain beyond the reach of classical machines. Such tasks address a growing number of industry use cases in optimisation, machine learning, simulation and cryptography across the logistics, mining, pharmaceutical, finance, agricultural, automotive, communications and defence industries.
However, creating such a device requires exquisite control of computing components at unimaginably small length scales, where enigmatic quantum behaviour dominates. In this talk, I describe that whilst this is enormously challenging and, at the edge of human endeavour, I do not think it impossible. I will describe how we have pioneered a globally unique technology to build electronic devices with atomic precision and how we are now using this capability to design and manufacture atomic-scale components into the circuitry of a quantum computer. I will show the world’s first atomically manufactured integrated circuit and discuss how we have used this to perform an analogue quantum simulation of the organic molecule polyacetylene. From this, I will map the path to a commercially useful quantum processor.
About the Presenter
Michelle Simmons AO FRS DistFRSN, Scientia Professor at UNSW Sydney, Director of the ARC Centre of Excellence in Quantum Computing and Communications Technology, and Founder of Silicon Quantum Computing, has pioneered unique technologies to build electronic devices at the atomic scale, pushing the boundaries of global research in classical computing, and opening up the prospect of developing a silicon-based quantum computer: a powerful new form of computing with the potential to transform information processing. Her achievements include the development of the world's smallest transistor, the narrowest conducting wires, 3D atomic electronics, and the first two-qubit gate using atom-based qubits in silicon. Most recently, in June 2022, the start-up company SQC, of which she is the founder and director, announced the world's first integrated circuit at the atomic scale, comprising 10 quantum dots, that created a quantum integrated circuit capable of simulating molecular behaviour.
About Ideas@theHouse
In late 2019, Her Excellency the Honourable Margaret Beazley AC QC, Governor of New South Wales and Patron of the Royal Society of NSW invited representatives of the Society to discuss how the Governor might open Government House to a series of public events based on important and/or influential ideas. Her Excellency’s proposal was that the Royal Society of NSW might devise a series of presentations and lectures, to be held at Government House, and known as Ideas@theHouse, on topics of our choice for an invited audience of our Members and Fellows, together with others to be invited by Her Excellency. This is the fifth in the Ideas@theHouse series but only the second to be held at “The House” — with the other three having to be held online in May 2020, April 2021, and July 2021 due to restrictions associated with the pandemic at the time.
