Yale Quantum Institute - Annual Report 2023

home of everything quantum at Yale

PART 1 Institute Mission and Activities

1. Welcome

The Yale Quantum Institute welcomes your interest in our activities, and we are pleased to present our 2023 annual report.

In this report, you will find information about the Institute, its mission and mandate, as well as some highlights of both our programs and the research performed by YQI members this year. Since the opening of our renovated offices at 17 Hillhouse in 2015, the Institute has become a forum and activity hub for scientific interchange and collaboration relating to quantum science.

After the strong perturbations caused to our public activities by the global health crisis, 2022 saw an unprecedented level of activity, comparable to our first few years. This year, Yale University announced bold new investments in the School of Engineering & Applied Science (SEAS) and in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) that will accelerate the university’s educational and research missions. These investments are already visible with the recent hired of new faculty members, two of which became YQI members: Yongshan Ding and Charles Brown (meet them page 10). Their groups will join the 25 YQI research groups focusing on increasing our understanding of science and quantum information.

To support this mission and foster collaborations, YQI hosted on campus a full slate of colloquia and seminars by national and international leading figures across the full spectrum of quantum science (physics, chemistry, nanoscience, optics and photonics, quantum information, computer science, engineering). This year, YQI was the stage of multiple government supported meetings and workshops (see page 9). In August, YQI Member Victor Batista hosted the NSF Centers for Chemical Innovation Quantum Computing Workshop which attracted chemists from ten US universities to discuss the last advancements in Quantum Chemistry. And in October, YQI hosted the first inperson gathering of the Co-design Center for Quantum Advantage (C2QA), one of the National Quantum Information Science Research Centers funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science. Welcoming over 200 attendees representing twenty-two universities, two national laboratories, and one industry partner. Having a venue like YQI is an invaluable tool to bring together all the actors who will build the tools necessary create scalable, distributed, and fault-tolerant quantum computer systems.

All the efforts by our YQI members to harness the power of science and quantum

information were noticed: Michel Devoret was the co-recipient of the Micius Quantum Prize for his groundbreaking work, including key contributions in the development of qubits (page 12) and Daniel Spielman won the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics for multiple discoveries in theoretical computer science and mathematics (page 14).

A large offering of outreach science programing was offered to the Yale and New Haven Community this year again. You can have a look back Yale Quantum Week, our celebration of Quantum Science (page 18) which included a sound and light show for Quantum World Day (page 22), and the wonderful art and science exhibition The Quantum Revolution, Handcrafted in New Haven (page 24), curated by our institute manager Dr. Florian Carle with artworks by former artist in Residence Martha W Lewis.

The artist in residence program continues with digital artist and virtual reality technologist, Stewart Smith who joined YQI as 2023 Artist in Residence (page 26) and will be featured in the International Festival of Arts and Ideas in June 2023.

We invite you to learn more about our work and programs through this annual report, and to share our optimism for new scientific and technological advances for the benefit of mankind.

We are looking forward to seeing you in person at YQI very soon!

1.1.  Executive team

The Quantum Institute is run by the executive team and advised by a board of faculty members from five departements at Yale.

Robert Schoelkopf INSTITUTE DIRECTOR

Sterling Professor of Applied Physics and Physics

A. Douglas Stone

DEPUTY DIRECTOR

Carl Morse Professor of Applied Physics and Physics

Carle INSTITUTE MANAGER

COORDINATOR

Florian

2. About the Institute

Life as we now know it would not be possible without several profound scientific and technological revolutions over the last century: the Industrial Revolution, the internal combustion engine, the telephone, and, most recently, the Digital Revolution which ushered in computers, cellular phones, and the Internet.

This transformative period was made possible by quantum theory, developed in the first half of the 20th century, which explained the fundamental laws of the atom and of light. At the onset of the 21st century, we are on the brink of a new quantum revolution – and Yale is paving the way.

Our faculty members, spanning the departments of Physics, Applied Physics, Computer Science, and Electrical and Mechanical Engineering, are making scientific breakthroughs that would have been unimaginable only a few decades ago. The Yale Quantum Institute was formed in 2015 to advance the progress in fundamental and applied quantum science at Yale and in the broader community of researchers across the globe. Yale has particular expertise in the theoretical and experimental development of new technologies to store and process quantum information. Our goal is to better understand the fundamental quantum laws that govern our universe, and to harness the unique features of quantum mechanics for novel sensors, secure communications, and, eventually, the realization of large-scale quantum computers. We now know that by employing a kind of massive parallel processing, computers based on “quantum bits” can address problems that would otherwise remain forever beyond the reach of our current computers. These problems include basic

algorithms underlying secure communication on the internet as well as quantum simulations of new materials, complex optimization problems, and improved machine learning. As with conventional computers, the true scope of their utility will only be discovered once they are built.

Beginning with pioneering work on macroscopic quantum coherence in the 80’s, to the realization of today’s quantum information processors, Yale professors are renowned for their leadership in the Quantum Revolution. In the past fifteen years, under the leadership of Devoret, Girvin, and Schoelkopf, the Yale superconducting science and technology team, comprising more than fifty researchers, has demonstrated several milestones in quantum computing including the development of the first solid state quantum information processors based on superconducting electronics. Together, the members of YQI are pursuing the collective goal of turning quantum physics into practical technologies and advancing our fundamental understanding of quantum science and engineering. We welcome researchers from around the world to visit and participate in this intellectual adventure.

3. Institute Mandate

Quantum sience is seen as a particularly difficult and intimidating subject. At YQI, we work to make it accessible to all.

3.1.  Excellence in research and outreach go hand in hand

25 FACULTY MEMBERS

40 POSTDOCS AND AR

120 GRADUATE STUDENTS

172 PUBLICATIONS

15,827 CITATIONS

All the programming and outreach activities performed by YQI is only possible thanks to the excellence of the research performed in the quantum laboratories. For more than 20 years, Yale has been at the forefront of quantum research, developing systems, theories, algorithms, tools, and techniques that have been widely adopted by the industry and tech giants, and training graduate students and postdocs who became an invaluable workforce: researchers and leaders in industry and national laboratories, lecturers, and associate and full professors in academia. YQI’s programming and outreach activities are made possible by the excellence of quantum research performed at Yale.

3.2.  Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

The Yale Quantum Institute is committed to fostering an environment of diversity, equity, and inclusion for every member of our community as we strive for excellence in research, teaching, and mentoring. We have established programs encouraging a welcoming environment that respects groups and their individual members: Physics Open Mic empowers students and postdocs by giving them a platform to voice their ideas; the Women In Quantum Information group promotes an inclusive environment for women in the field; and the speakers for our outreach programs are invited with gender parity and racial diversity in mind to give attendees a correct representation of the field as well as challenge unconscious bias.

4. Mission and programs

The Institute acts as an intellectual hub for quantum information science and engineering, and of quantum science more generally, through fostering collaboration and welcoming world leaders in the field.

The Yale Quantum Institute was founded to enhance Yale’s leadership in the field of quantum science and technology. It serves as a forum to bring together experimental and theoretical researchers at Yale in the fields of quantum information science and engineering, quantum control, quantum measurement, and quantum many-body physics and chemistry. The Institute also runs an active visitors program to bring in quantum scientists from leading institutions worldwide, and hosts conferences and workshops in sub-fields relating to its core mission.

The past two decades have seen breakthroughs in both the theory and practice of quantum science. The properties of superposition and entanglement, once thought of as paradoxical and counter intuitive, are understood now as unique resources. Recent progress in the laboratory allows unprecedented control over individual quantum objects, whether they are naturally occurring microscopic systems like atoms, or macroscopic man-made systems with engineered properties.

These advances may soon enable us to: perform otherwise intractable computations, ensure privacy in communications, better understand and design novel states of matter, and develop new types of sensors and measurement devices. Today, a new discipline is emerging which combines physics, chemistry, electrical engineering, mathematics, and computer science to further the basic understanding of the quantum world, and to develop novel information processing devices and other quantum-enabled measurement and sensing technologies.

COLLOQUIA & SEMINAR

For Yale researchers

Every academic year, the Institute presents an exciting series of technical seminars and colloquia from experts in the fields of quantum information science, quantum control, quantum measurement, and quantum many-body physics. Speakers are proposed by members of the Yale Quantum Institute community and approved by a selection committee. The talks are attended by a diverse cross section of the university ranging from undergraduates to emeritus professors.

DISTINGUISHED LECTURER SERIES

For the Yale Community

VENUE FOR QUANTUM INFORMATION EVENTS

For Yale and our external collaborators

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT AND NETWORKING SERIES

For graduate students and postdocs

VISITORS PROGRAM

For external researchers

To recognize a researcher whose work significantly advances quantum science, YQI awards the title of Distinguished Lecturer, with emphasis on the areas of mesoscopic physics, nanoscience, quantum information, quantum computing and related theoretical and mathematical topics. Annually, a Distinguished Lecturer is invited to visit the Yale Quantum Institute to deliver one or more lectures about their work and how it has advanced our understanding of quantum science.

The Institute hosts many seminars, presentations, group meetings and other events in the field of quantum information science and engineering. This year, YQI hosted the NSF Centers for Chemical Innovation Quantum Computing Workshop and the National Quantum Information Science hub C2QA All Hands Meeting.

We offer a selection of presentations to help students and postdocs with career development, job searching, and networking. For this series, Yale alumni share their career experiences, answer questions on working in their industry, and offer an opportunity for attendees to build a career network. Speakers in this series have included noted scientists, industry leaders, and legal advisors.

The Yale Quantum Institute opens its doors to world leaders in quantum information science for visits on the Yale campus. The visiting scientists can focus on their research in close proximity to YQI researchers (faculty members and students) to enable fruitful collaborations.

5. New YQI Members

This year, Yale University announced bold new investments in the School of Engineering & Applied Science (SEAS) and in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) that will accelerate the university’s educational and research missions. These investments are already visible with the recent hired of new faculty members, two of which became YQI members.

5.1.  Yongshan Ding

Yongshan Ding joined Yale as Assistant Professor of Computer Science and is affiliated with the Computer Systems Lab (CSL). His Quantum Systems Lab (QSL) produces impactful research that improves the capability and performance of next-generation quantum computing systems. His group’s work on a broad set of problems related to algorithms and computer architecture in quantum computing. Yongshan Ding is the host of the Quantum Computing Colloquium, hosted jointly by YQI and Yale CS, for an engaging conversation on the latest advances in the field of quantum computing. The series is founded on the idea that researchers across disciplines must work together to unlock the power of quantum computers.

5.2.  Charles D Brown II

Charles D. Brown II joins Yale as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Physics. Professor Brown studies single-, few-, and many-body quantum physics by conducting quantum simulation experiments using ultracold atoms trapped in optical potentials. These experiments allow for the investigation of complex quantum systems for the purpose of understanding their ordered phases and dynamics. His recent experimental work, published in Science, has focused on understanding the role of topology in the energy band structure of a crystal, which is important for understanding exotic quantum properties of materials.

1. Michel Devoret honored for cuttingedge work in quantum physics

Michel Devoret is a co-recipient of the Micius Quantum Prize for his groundbreaking work, including key contributions in the development of qubits.

Michel Devoret, the F.W. Beinecke Professor of Applied Physics and Physics, is a co-recipient of the Micius Quantum Prize for his groundbreaking work in quantum physics — including key contributions in the development of the artificial atoms of quantum information known as qubits.

The Micius Quantum Prize, awarded since 2018, honors significant advances in quantum science ranging from early conceptual contributions to recent experimental breakthroughs. Named for the ancient Chinese philosopher Mozi, the prize was established with donations from private entrepreneurs.

Devoret shares the prize with John Clarke of the University of CaliforniaBerkeley and Yasunobu Nakamura of the University of Tokyo.

Devoret did some of the seminal work on artificial atom design in the mid1980s, working in Clarke’s lab. He later returned to his native France in the late 1980s, starting his own research group at the Commissariat à l’Energie Atomique (CEA) at Saclay, where he continued his fundamental research on quantum mechanical electronics and qubits with Daniel Esteve and Cristian Urbina.

He joined the Yale faculty in 2002.

At Yale, working with colleagues including Robert Schoelkopf and Steven Girvin, Devoret has dramatically advanced the field of superconducting qubits with controllable dynamics. A qubit is a unit of quantum information. Unlike information in the “classical” state, which can be either a zero or a one, information in the quantum state can be a zero, a one, or a superposition of both zero and one.

Devoret and Schoelkopf are considered the undisputed leaders in the

experimental development of circuit quantum electrodynamics (circuit QED), in which the concepts of quantum optics have been brought to bear on superconducting microwave electrical circuits.

“Michel Devoret is a pioneer and international leader in the development of ‘artificial atoms’ created using superconducting electrical circuits,” said Girvin, the Eugene Higgins Professor of Physics at Yale.

“Michel’s foundational research has helped launch a new revolution in quantum mechanics,” Girvin added. “The Micius Quantum Prize is a wonderful recognition of the contributions that he and his co-recipients have made to both fundamental and applied quantum science and engineering.”

Devoret is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the French Academy of Sciences. He is the recipient of the Ampere Prize of the French Academy of Science (together with Daniel Esteve), the Descartes-Huygens Prize of the Royal Academy of Science of the Netherlands, and the Europhysics-Agilent Prize of the European Physical Society (with Daniel Esteve, Hans Mooij, and Yasunobu Nakamura). He was awarded the Olli Lounasmaa Memorial Prize of Aalto University.

Devoret is also a recipient of the John Stewart Bell Prize, which he received jointly with Schoelkopf, and the Fritz London Memorial Prize, which he won together with John Martinis and Schoelkopf.

Devoret is a member of the Yale Quantum Institute and leads the devices sub-group on quantum error correction for the Co-design Center for Quantum Advantage (C2QA) led by Brookhaven National Laboratory.

Recipients of the Micius Quantum Prize are awarded one million Chinese yuan (about $150,000) and a gold medal.

“This is richly deserved and a testament to the excellence of Prof. Devoret’s research,” said Vidvuds Ozolins, the Tom Steyer and Kat Taylor Professor of Clean Energy Solutions and chair of the Department of Applied Physics at Yale. “He has been a wonderful mentor to his students and postdoctoral associates. We are honored to have him on our faculty and we are looking forward to strengthening and investing in quantum research at Yale.”

Jim Shelton for Yale News

2. Daniel Spielman has won the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics

Daniel Spielman has won the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics for “multiple discoveries in theoretical computer science and mathematics.”

YQI member Daniel Spielman has won the Breakthrough Prize in Mathematics for “ multiple discoveries in theoretical computer science and mathematics.” The prize comes with a $3 million award.

“The Breakthrough Prize is a tremendous and well-deserved honor for Dan, whose work has been incredibly important to the fields of computer science, mathematics, and data science,” said Jeffrey Brock, dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science. “His is the kind of work that reaffirms the fundamental value of abstract and foundational research, demonstrating how it can lay the groundwork for impactful and real-world benefits in numerous facets of life, in ways that we cannot always predict.”

The foundation cited several of Spielman’s achievements, including his role in solving the KadisonSinger conjecture, a problem that had gone unsolved by mathematicians for more than 50 years. The problem essentially asks whether unique information can be gleaned from a system in which only some of the features can be observed or measured. The solution has relevance for numerous fields, including statistics, pure mathematics, the mathematical foundations of quantum physics, and computer science.

The Breakthrough Foundation also cited Spielman’s contributions to spectral graph theory, numerical linear algebra, optimization, and coding theory. Spielman has said that much of his work has focused on designing faster algorithms to solve systems in linear equations, and then leveraging those algorithms to perform other functions even faster. Winning the Breakthrough Prize, he said, is “a huge honor and a little overwhelming.”

“I am excited that the committee has chosen to recognize work at the interface of theoretical computer science and mathematics,” said Spielman “I have always loved how our era of digital technology allows advances in mathematics to become real-world technology, and how technological problems can inspire the development of pure mathematics. People like me who work between the two are never sure whether to call ourselves ‘mathematicians’ or ‘computer scientists’ because we are always mixing the fields.”

William Weir for Yale News

3. Looking for quantum potholes

This year, Insights & Outcomes dedicated one of their monthly edition to highlight the work of YQI member Charles D. Brown II work.

In some quantum mechanical systems, researchers say, the energy landscape is going to have a few “potholes” — touching points where the state of the system is not defined. Understanding how these potholes, known as singularities, affect a quantum system’s behavior is a key area of physics research.

In a new study in the journal Science, incoming Yale assistant professor of physics Charles D. Brown II and his collaborators found a new approach for probing certain types of quantum singularities.

For the study, Brown and co-authors from the University of California-Berkeley conducted a unique quantum simulation experiment with intersecting lasers that trap and manipulate ultra-cold atoms in crystals made of light. The researchers moved the atoms along trajectories that entered, turned, and exited singularities at linear touching points (called Dirac points) and quadratic touching points.

A quadratic band touching point is a point at which two energy bands have equal values — but away from this point the energy values are non-equal, and the gap between the energy bands grows proportional to the square of the distance from the point.

The researchers found that the ultimate state of the system depended only on the entry and exit angles through the singularities.

“We developed a distinct method to probe singularities, importantly including non-Dirac singularities, in ultracold atom quantum simulators,” Brown said.

Brown is first author and co-corresponding author of the study. Dan Stamper-Kurn of the University of California-Berkeley is the senior and co-corresponding author.

4. Knots in the resonator: elegant math in humble physics

At the heart of every resonator — be it a cello, a gravitational wave detector, or the antenna in your cell phone — there is a beautiful bit of mathematics.

At the heart of every resonator — be it a cello, a gravitational wave detector, or the antenna in your cell phone — there is a beautiful bit of mathematics that has been heretofore unacknowledged. YQI members Jack Harris and Nicholas Read know this because they started finding knots in their data. In a new study in the journal Nature, Harris, Read, and their co-authors describe a previously unknown characteristic of resonators. If you make a graph of how the resonator’s frequencies change while you “tune” the resonator — by varying its properties in almost any way — the graph will show braids and knots.

“The resonances twist around each other. It’s awesome,” Harris said. “It means any time you tune an instrument, you’re making a braid. And if you tune it so that you keep two of the resonances equal, you’re making a knot.”Harris is an experimental physicist. His bread and butter is exploring the ways topology and quantum mechanics influence sound and light. Often, he conducts experiments using resonators that trap light or sound in physical cavities. Yet despite the high-tech nature of the work, there are analogs to working with much simpler instruments.“If you’re designing a violin and you want to know all the ways that it can vibrate, you’re doing the same thing we are in my lab,” Harris said. “It’s the physics of vibration.”

A few years ago, Harris was trying to understand some curious features that appeared in his data when he was tuning a cavity. He turned to his colleague Nicholas Read who explained that these features were braids and were simply expressions of a fundamental math principle. “But when he explained that our data should contain trefoil knots, I was hooked,” Harris said.

A trefoil knot is a figure found in the iconography of many cultures. It is also found in the artwork of M.C. Escher. Knots of this type are very familiar to mathematicians, but don’t often crop up in physics. Harris and Read designed an experiment in which they tuned three frequencies of a resonator and did, indeed, observe the predicted braids and knots.

The discovery, while basic for mathematics, may prove useful for physicists and engineers. “It’s a potentially powerful tool, knowing that frequencies can braid in a resonator,” Harris said. “That’s because a braid is a topological object, meaning it doesn’t change its essential character if you deform it a bit. It stays a braid unless you really mess it up. This is a special kind of robustness that we think can be used to prevent errors in applications that rely on precisely tuning resonators.”

The first author of the study is Yogesh Patil, an associate research scientist in the Harris lab. Co-authors, along with Harris and Read, are Judith Höller, Parker Henry, Chitres Guria, Yiming Zhang, Luyao Jiang, and Nenad Kralj.

1. Outreach Programs

YQI’s public programs invite everyone to learn and reflect about this exciting new area of science and technology.

1.1.  Nontechnical talk Series

YQI organizes non-technical talks to engage the public and try to combat science-phobia, more specifically, quantum physics phobia. These talks seek to communicate the excitement of scientific exploration and educate the audience about the role that science plays in our daily life. At the time of this report, we have organized 15 non-technical talks that attracted 2800+ attendees, indicating a great interest and need for this type of programming. These talks are co-sponsored by The Franke Program in Science and the Humanities.

1.2.  Video Library

VIDEOS

QuantumInstitute.yale.edu/videos

HAVE A LOOK BACK!

Turn to the next page for photographies of Quantum Week at Yale

Every science outreach event created and hosted by YQI is recorded and posted on Yale YouTube channel to allow on-demand viewing and give access to our content to people outside of the Yale Community. Addition to the library this year include a workshop on Secure Quantum Encryption, and two art & science videos: Digital Art meets Quantum Simulations, and Living In A Quantum State | Ann O’Dea in conversation with Florian Carle.

1.3.  Quantum Week at Yale

There are a lot of activities around Quantum Sciences and Information at Yale. Quantum science and engineering was identified as one of five top priority areas for the next decade in the University’s Science Strategy Report, Yale quantum researchers are leader in the field and saw their technology widely used in the recent quantum breakthroughs. However, for most people on campus, quantum physics stays an obscure topic filled up with dead and alive cats and other spooky actions at a distance. To help people outside the field to enter the fascinating world of quantum science, YQI hosted last year, in April 2022, Quantum Week at Yale, a full week with 23 events all over campus to celebrate Yale leadership in this field!

2. Arts & Science the British Isles

YQI participated to “Living in a Quantum State” a series fostering dialogue around the use of quantum technologies through the lens of art.

Florian Carle, the Yale School of Engineering and Applied Science Director of Interdisciplinary Initiatives, creator and producer of the YQI Artist in Residence program, was invited to participate to two public events in the series “Living in a Quantum State”, hosted by the Goethe Institut.

For the first night in Dublin, artists, physicists, philosophers and practitioners came together to shine a light on the current landscape of quantum computing and to explore the future of quantum technologies and the arts. Ann O’Dea and Florian Carle discussed the kind of art is currently being made with quantum technologies around the world and the artistic projects that have stemmed from YQI artist-in-residence program.

The second night in London, Eduardo Miranda proposed a live music demonstration using quantum computers to celebrate the launch of the new book Quantum Computer Music: Foundations, Methods and Advanced Concepts. This book includes the chapter “Superconducting Qubits as Musical Synthesizers for Live Performance” written by former YQI Artist-in-Residence Spencer Topel, Kyle Serniak, Luke Burkhart, Florian Carle, sharing the technical details and composition work of the electronic album “Quantum Sound” produced at YQI.

Photos: Goethe-Institut | Molly Keane, Pau Ros

3. A Look back at Quantum Week at Yale

Photos: Florian Carle, Allie Barton, Po Eic Quah

4. Sounds from another realm

A glowing buiding in a stormy night is the perfect stage for an album debut.

Under an early evening dusk, made darker by rain clouds overhead, shades of red, blue, and rose flowed across the white façade of 17 Hillhouse Avenue as an electronic landscape of sounds pulsed from speakers.

This was the scene on a recent April evening, as a crowd gathered outside the home of the Yale Quantum Institute (YQI) to celebrate the end of Yale Quantum Week and the release of the album “Quantum Sound,” a collaboration between a trio of scientists and musicians — Spencer Topel, a sound artist and composer and the 2018-2019 YQI artist-in-residence, and two former Yale physics graduate students, Kyle Serniak ’19 Ph.D. and Luke Burkhart ’20 Ph.D. They were brought together by Florian Carle, YQI’s manager and creator of the artist-in-residence program, and the producer of the album.

The album project, which transforms the measurements of superconducting quantum devices into sound, both reflects the raw data and shapes it into an audio narrative.

“In the same way that some people are more receptive to music as opposed to visual art, they may be more receptive to music as a medium for conveying certain scientific concepts,” said Serniak, who now works at MIT Lincoln Laboratory, a federally funded research and development center in Massachusetts.

Topel looks at the project in the other direction: “How can quantum physics unlock new forms of musical and artistic expression?

“Eventually some of these [quantum] experiments will yield new devices that we can use to solve altogether different problems,” he went on. “A portion of these problems will be art, dance, writing, and music.”

“Quantum Sound” may not have the hooks to propel it up the Billboard charts, but attendees of the Yale event — about 150 physics-heads, electronic-music geeks, and assorted curiosity seekers — quickly snapped

WANT MORE?

More photographies of the light show are on the previous pages!

up the 100 vinyl copies of the album offered as a giveaway. The album is a single 32-minute track, split into two sides: “Noise” and “Tone.” The light show, designed by Carle, used tones of blue and red to signify the movement of superconducting qubits from a grounded state to an excited one.

As the album played, soft sonic waves gave way to what sounded like rolls of thunder; fittingly, as the music rose to a crescendo, the skies opened up. Undeterred by the downpour, the intrepid audience sheltered under umbrellas and listened on.

The project, which was first performed live at the International Festival of Arts and Ideas in June 2019, has had a longer afterlife than even its creators anticipated. “At the beginning it just seemed like a fun idea,” said Serniak. “I am pleasantly surprised that it’s being pressed on vinyl and that we’re still talking about it three years later!”

“Quantum Sound” was also presented at the first International Symposium on Quantum Computing and Musical Creativity, an online event held last fall. And a chapter detailing the science behind the art, from the datagenerating technology the trio used to the musical motifs they surfaced, will be published in the forthcoming book “Quantum Computer Music: Foundations, Methods and Advanced Concepts.” And Topel is looking into releasing the instruments they used for “Quantum Sound” — three variations of quantum synthesizers — on a software platform that would allow students of all ages to experiment with the technology and get closer to the science.

“This project really changed how I think about the tools we use as artists to perceive the world,” said Topel. “Superconducting systems, like the ones being studied at Yale, have great computational potential, but they also offer us a glimpse into an altogether different part of our universe, the quantum realm.”

Andrea Thompson Peed for Yale News

Photos: Christine Gauthier, Florian Carle, Victoria Misenti

THE QUANTUM REVOLUTION

HANDCRAFTED IN NEW HAVEN

Thrilling.

I get giddy when I think about going into the lab to visit the devices. The mysterious, cantankerous, beautiful fridges.

Labors of love and sweat.

It’s an exotic situation for me to be inrooms full of shiny instruments, working away, packed with tiny experiment boxes nestled into their complex bellies, each one with its own preferences, quirks, history, and narrative.

This is going away.

At least in its current iteration. What I am attracted to here, now, is on the way out, fast.

SEE THE EXHIBITION

See the online version at art.quantuminstitute.yale.edu

In 2022, YQI attracted 1100+ persons to the museum to learn about quantum history.

Blink. Gone.

- Martha W Lewis

This art & science exhibition curated by Florian Carle was on display for 7 months at The New Haven Museum and featured superconductive quantum devices portraits drawn by artist Martha W. Lewis, quantum prototypes scavanged from the laboratores over the years, and a six-foot dilution refrigerator named Badger, who ran in 2009 the world’s first demonstration of two-qubit algorithms, with a superconducting quantum processor. This single-gallery exhibition captured the history of quantum technology in the making (Yale researchers developed an entire new field of research called circuit quantum electrodynamics) during a brief period before the commercialization of quantum computers rewrites history altogether.

6. Digital artist and virtual reality technologist, Stewart Smith, joins YQI as Artist in Residence

The Yale Quantum Institute continues its involvement at the intersection of art and science by welcoming digital artist and virtual reality technologist, Stewart Smith, for the academic year 2022–2023.

Stewart has a long history of operating at the intersection of art and science, from creating digital artworks in collaboration with the Center for Art and Media (ZKM) in Germany, to working within Google’s Creative Lab and Data Arts Team, to his current role as Head of Consumer Augmented Reality at Unity Technologies where he’s helping to craft the future of augmented and virtual reality creation.

Although Stewart taught himself to program computers at a young age, he pursued an academic interest in art rather than computer science, receiving his MFA in graphic design from Yale University. Stewart’s artworks have been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, ZKM in Germany, the SFMOMA in San Francisco, and is in the permanent collection of the Fondation Cartier in Paris. Over the past few years he’s taken a deep interest in quantum computing—teaching himself the logic of quantum circuits by building Q.js, an open-source, browser-based quantum circuit composer and circuit simulator. (Try it live at QuantumJavaScript.app)

Earlier this year, Stewart gave a public talk about his work and practice at YQI titled “For the Hapless Dreamers: Digital Art meets Quantum Simulations” as part of our nontechnical talks series.

We are delighted he’s agreed to join YQI as an Artist in Residence. In this role, Stewart will interact with our faculty members, researchers, and students, attend our colloquia and events, and produce digital artwork based on the work of, and in collaboration with, YQI researchers.

LEARN MORE!

Follow Stewart’s residency at

What really makes me happy is partnering with smart friends to take on the impossible —or the ridiculous.

Photos: Florian Carle

The Yale Quantum Institute facilitates the research and teaching of quantum science on the Yale campus. YQI performs outreach in the form of seminars, workshops, and by hosting leading scientists from around the world.