CarboQuant

The researchers on the CarboQuant team at Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology in Dübendorf, Switzerland, are working on a methodology and infrastructure to further develop carbon nanostructures whose quantum effects can be used in a broad range of electronic components. The aim is for these novel components to function at room temperature and find application in common devices.

Roman Fasel is project leader of CarboQuant, his colleague Oliver Gröning deputy project leader. For the past twelve years, the two physicists have been working with their team to create the scientific basis for their new project: graphene nanoribbons. Over time, they’ve accumulated knowledge on how to control quantum effects through altering a nanoribbon’s structures. They’re now able to manipulate the complex graphene nanoribbons with ultra-high precision – a major development, as changes to one single atom makes an enormous difference.

The researchers plan to use the funding from the Werner Siemens Foundation to build a technology platform on which graphene nanoribbons, as the basic material, are available in a type of library. At the same time, they also plan to establish a dependable infrastructure and methodology to characterise the nanoribbons. To further develop the nanomaterials for use in daily devices, however, a great deal of painstaking labour still awaits them.

The Empa nanoribbons already meet a key requirement: they remain stable at normal ambient temperatures. This is a major difference to developments in the many other quantum technology projects being conducted all over the world, which rely on extremely low temperatures and thus need gigantic, horrendously expensive cooling systems. In the CarboQuant project, the overall aim is a quantum technology that doesn’t require costly cooling systems, that consumes less energy and that’s based on carbon – which is non-toxic, inexpensive and widely available. In short, a technology for everyday applications and devices.