The second quantum revolution is underway and the deployment of Quantum Technologies (QT) keeps pace with it. This technological paradigm-switch creates opportunities and challenges for industry, innovation and society. Several large companies, as well as start-ups, have started to develop and engineer quantum devices or begun to integrate them into their products: the commercial success of QT, together with progress in research and development, relies on certification and reliability built upon internationally agreed standards and metrological traceability. A group of European National Metrology Institutes (NMIs) and Delegated Institutes (DIs) have recently created a European Metrology Network for Quantum Technologies (EMN-Q) under the auspices of EURAMET. The objective of the EMN-Q is to co-ordinate the activities of the European NMIs and Dis to ensure their efficient support for European competitiveness in quantum technologies. A special focus of the EMN-Q will be to develop new measurement capabilities and dedicated services to serve the rapidly-growing needs of industry and research institutions in this field. Industry, governmental agencies, academic sectors or any other type of stakeholder are welcome to contact the EMN-Q and discuss their metrology needs. These can relate not only to quantum characteristics of quantum devices, but also to metrology of key enabling technologies, metrology that can improve the supply chain of industrial quantum devices or other industrial needs connected with quantum technologies. EMN-Q aims to become is to become the central contact point to stakeholders interested in metrology for quantum technologies by: • contributing to standardisation & certification of quantum technologies; • promoting the take-up of metrology in the development of these technologies; • supporting industrial needs in synergy with the technological objectives of the EC Quantum Flagship and national quantum technology programs; and • promoting the use of quantum measurement techniques where advantageous for “classical” technical areas. We are in process of structuring and developing the communication services of the EMN-Q. One of the key aspect in this EMN-Q development is the establishment the EMN-Q Strategic Research Agenda (SRA). The SRA will contain the technological roadmaps that are created by the EMN-Q members in consultation with the EMN-Q Stakeholder Community. In this paper, we will provide a short overview of the EMN-Q organization, and of the SRA and the relative Technological Roadmaps.
The second quantum revolution is underway and the deployment of Quantum Technologies (QT) keeps pace with it. This technological paradigm-switch creates opportunities and challenges for industry, innovation and society. Several large companies, as well as start-ups, have started to develop and engineer quantum devices or begun to integrate them into their products: the commercial success of QT, together with progress in research and development, relies on certification and reliability built upon internationally agreed standards and metrological traceability. A group of European National Metrology Institutes (NMIs) and Delegated Institutes (DIs) have recently created a European Metrology Network for Quantum Technologies (EMN-Q) under the auspices of EURAMET. The objective of the EMN-Q is to co-ordinate the activities of the European NMIs and Dis to ensure their efficient support for European competitiveness in quantum technologies. A special focus of the EMN-Q will be to develop new measurement capabilities and dedicated services to serve the rapidly-growing needs of industry and research institutions in this field. Industry, governmental agencies, academic sectors or any other type of stakeholder are welcome to contact the EMN-Q and discuss their metrology needs. These can relate not only to quantum characteristics of quantum devices, but also to metrology of key enabling technologies, metrology that can improve the supply chain of industrial quantum devices or other industrial needs connected with quantum technologies. EMN-Q aims to become is to become the central contact point to stakeholders interested in metrology for quantum technologies by: • contributing to standardisation & certification of quantum technologies; • promoting the take-up of metrology in the development of these technologies; • supporting industrial needs in synergy with the technological objectives of the EC Quantum Flagship and national quantum technology programs; and • promoting the use of quantum measurement techniques where advantageous for “classical” technical areas. We are in process of structuring and developing the communication services of the EMN-Q. One of the key aspect in this EMN-Q development is the establishment the EMN-Q Strategic Research Agenda (SRA). The SRA will contain the technological roadmaps that are created by the EMN-Q members in consultation with the EMN-Q Stakeholder Community. In this paper, we will provide a short overview of the EMN-Q organization, and of the SRA and the relative Technological Roadmaps.
Emerging technologies demand innovations in metrology: • Agility – to keep pace with a rapidly changing technical landscape; • Ability – to develop novel, perhaps first-ever, measurement capabilities; • Comparability and interoperability – across vendors, in commercial timeframes; • Accelerated delivery – because formal standards may be obsolete by the time they’re published. The same quantum technologies that have revolutionized metrology, such as Josephson junctions that are used to create the world’s most accurate voltage standards and ion traps that are used in time and frequency standards, also underpin emerging new markets in quantum computing, networking and sensing – and these quantum-based products require entirely new approaches for measurement and characterization. The world’s metrology institutes have been at the forefront of the quantum revolution, being both early developers and adopters of quantum technologies for metrology, and are uniquely poised to spearhead the development of metrology for quantum – those measurements and related standards needed by industry to underpin quantum-based products. The metrology community is positioned to create trust in the emerging quantum economy due to its long history of objectivity, neutrality and international collaboration; anticipating industry’s needs to be ready with rigorous measurement capabilities as technologies evolve; and its having formed institutions such as the CIPM, BIPM and IMEKO to support collaborative efforts. The BIPM hosted a workshop in March 2024 which brought together 149 participants from 43 NMIs and designated institutes (DIs) from 39 economies, along with industry representatives, to discuss how best to leverage the expertise of the worlds national metrology institutes (NMIs) and their designated institutes (DIs) to accelerate the development and adoption of quantum technologies through measurements and standards. The workshop supported coordinated development and sharing of measurement “best practices” in support of future standardization, the mission of a new collaborative initiative referred to as NMI-Q. The NMI-Q organizing committee, comprised of representatives of the NMIs of Australia, Canada, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States, are working on a cooperation framework inspired by the successful VAMAS organization, which conducts coordinated pre-standardization work in material science. NMI-Q has initiated early work in quantum photonics, and expects to expand to a breadth of technical areas, such as measurement and characterization to support multiple quantum computing platforms, quantum networking models, and sensing modalities.
Abstract The Second Quantum Revolution facilitates the engineering of new classes of sensors, communication technologies, and computers with unprecedented capabilities. Supply chains for quantum technologies are emerging, some focused on commercially available components for enabling technologies and/or quantum-technologies research infrastructures, others with already higher technology-readiness levels, near to the market. In 2018, the European Commission has launched its large-scale and long-term Quantum Flagship research initiative to support and foster the creation and development of a competitive European quantum technologies industry, as well as the consolidation and expansion of leadership and excellence in European quantum technology research. One of the measures to achieve an accelerated development and uptake has been identified by the Quantum Flagship in its Strategic Research Agenda: The promotion of coordinated, dedicated standardisation and certification efforts. Standardisation is indeed of paramount importance to facilitate the growth of new technologies, and the development of efficient and effective supply chains. The harmonisation of technologies, methodologies, and interfaces enables interoperable products, innovation, and competition, all leading to structuring and hence growth of markets. As quantum technologies mature, the time has come to start thinking about further standardisation needs. This article presents insights on standardisation for quantum technologies from the perspective of the CEN-CENELEC Focus Group on Quantum Technologies (FGQT), which was established in June 2020 to coordinate and support the development of standards relevant for European industry and research.
As part of the French National Quantum Strategy, MetriQs-France is the National Program on measurement, evaluation and standardization of quantum technologies. With the ambition to support technology development and establishment of a thriving and sustainable quantum industry, MetriQs-France aims at developing measurement capabilities of reference for reliable, comparable, and impartial characterization and performance evaluation of these emerging technologies. These are key to demonstrate indisputably the possible advantage of quantum technologies over existing ones and to enable their adoption by industry and market. These questions are all the more important in the context of the high promises of quantum technologies for many applications (from sensing to computing, passing through communications and cryptography) and regarding the related impacts in many sectors. The program has three specific objectives: (1) Develop the reference measurement capabilities, which will be validated, harmonized, and recognized, for traceable, comparable, reproducible, and accurate device characterization and performance evaluation; (2) Test and evaluate the technologies using the above mentioned capabilities; (3) Promote worldwide the measurement capabilities and results through e.g., collaborations, scientific papers, good practice guides, metrology services, and importantly standardization. The program addresses the measurement needs on different topics, like quantum computing, quantum sensing and enabling technologies. It involves actors of the whole ecosystem: research organizations, industry - from startups to large companies -, standardization development organizations, like AFNOR at the national level. MetriQs-France is coordinated by LNE, the French national metrology institute, which takes advantage of its expertise in metrology, including the delivery of high-level measurement services, its competencies in quantum technologies, and its status of independent and trusted third party. Practically, the program comprises two complementary parts: (1) collaborative R&D projects about reference measurement capabilities, together with exploitation and promotion actions; (2) deployment of a measurement and testing infrastructure. This infrastructure is based on an expert and independent quantum metrology platform hosted by the French national metrology network labs coordinated by LNE. The platform, which gathers unique metrology skills, state-of-the-art equipment and well-controlled experimental environment, addresses characterization of solid state qubits and their enabling technologies, including very low temperature thermometry, as well as characterization of quantum gravimeters and atomic clocks. The infrastructure will unfold through a network of trusted characterization and testing facilities for quantum technologies. Regarding the R&D projects, the first project called BACQ [1], started in September 2023 and is dedicated to application-oriented benchmarks for quantum computing. Additional R&D projects are about to be started in 2025. About standardization, MetriQs-France actively supports the activities of French experts in the European and International committees, like CEN-CENELEC JTC22 and IEC/ISO JTC3, through the growing French national committee on quantum technologies at AFNOR. [1] https://arxiv.org/abs/2403.12205
The ongoing second quantum revolution will lead to unprecedented technological capabilities opening up important scientific progress and business opportunities. The worldwide investments in quantum technology are important in the academic as well as in the industrial sector. However, these new technologies must also be duly characterised and calibrated with measurements traceable to the International System of Units, as it is the standard today for classical technologies. An accessible and fit for purpose testing infrastructure for quantum technology is thus clearly needed. In this paper we give an overview of our vision of a Swiss metrology competence centre for quantum technologies at the Swiss Federal Institute of Metrology METAS and highlight the present state of the recent developments.
Quantum physics looks back at over a century of tradition and represents the foundation of metrology. The last twenty years of progress in science and technology have seen a tremendous increase in the level of control over quantum systems at the most elementary level. This development paves the way for novel applications of quantum technology with relevance for economy and potentially disruptive impact. With this potential comes the need to support the dynamic development with metrology for the emerging quantum industry to create trust, reliability, enable comparability and thus lay the foundation for a future quality infrastructure. The Quantum Technology Center (QTZ) at PTB is addressing this need for several quantum technologies. Examples include: Ion traps, as a hardware platform for quantum clocks, quantum sensors and quantum computers, have evolved to mature quantum devices which already made the step from a research object into an industrial product. Providing novel products for end users requires fair comparisons of these devices, consequently requiring standardized methods for testing and characterization. QTZ has successfully established a characterization setup for ion traps from industry and academia, providing a stable environment for reproducible and fair comparisons. Many quantum communication technologies, particularly quantum key distribution, operate within the single-photon domain, leveraging the non-cloning theorem to prevent eavesdropping by transmitting individual photons. QTZ contributes to the establishment of a robust foundation for standardized characterization and future certification activities, by offering testing facilities for key components, such as single-photon detectors, optical attenuators, isolators, and spectral filters. The precise clocked transport of single electrons has gained a lot of interest for the 2019 revised SI system as a unique and elegant way of a direct realization of the unit ampere. QTZ is developing single-electron pumps based on quantum dots, with the general objectives of robustness, reproducibility and scaling. In addition to their primary use in metrology, these universal devices can be of interest for applications in quantum technology, e.g. in quantum computing as so-called spin qubit shuttles, a connecting path over several µm in length between different qubits, enabling the scaling of complex multiple qubit systems. Across all fields, documentary standards, developed in an international consensus framework, are a fundamental part of a successful quantum technology ecosystem. PTB is actively contributing to the International IEC/ISO JTC3 and the European CEN/CENELEC JTC22. These activities are complemented by several projects in cooperation with industry. In this contribution, we will give an overview of our activities and discuss future challenges and opportunities of metrology for quantum technology and the emerging quantum industry.
Advances in quantum mechanics have long underpinned metrology by enabling practical realizations of units through quantum effects. With the 2019 SI revision, traceability is anchored in defined fundamental constants, reinforcing the quantum-mechanical basis of modern standards. In parallel, quantum technologies are transitioning from laboratory science to engineering and early industrial deployment, bringing familiar pressures for integration, reliability, cost reduction, supply-chain formation, and standardization. The direction of benefit is thus reversing: metrology and precision measurement are becoming enabling infrastructure for the industrialization of quantum technologies. Against this backdrop, this paper surveys the metrology and precision-measurement capabilities required across representative quantum-computing modalities and identifies where electrical and related metrology can contribute to the development, characterization, and reliable operation of quantum hardware. We then discuss cross-cutting measurement needs and standardization opportunities that recur across platforms, and note how similar frameworks can extend to emerging quantum-sensing applications.