SCHOOL OF PHYSICS PHYSICS News AUTUMN 2014 Quantum computinG REcoRD BREAKER A University of Sydney researcher’s A working quantum computer would exploit the mysterious properties of quantum physics, allowing the most difficult proposal has led to a new world computational problems - impractical for even the fastest record for the largest quantum supercomputers - to become feasible to solve. “Huge advances in telecommunications, physics and ‘circuit board’ ever produced - an counterintelligence are possible when we have devices with essential component for a quantum such immense computational power.” “The two main obstacles to creating quantum computers computer made of laser light. are the precise control of tiny quantum systems and the issue of scalability, which is the ability to make bigger and The international collaboration with bigger quantum computers out of small parts,” said Dr the University of Tokyo and the Menicucci. Australian National University has seen the largest number of quantum “We have made a breakthrough in scalability for the basic systems brought together in a single ‘circuit board’ of a quantum computer made out of laser component jump from 14 to 10,000. light.” “The transistor, invented in the mid- The design proposed by Dr Menicucci allowed Professor 1940s, replaced vacuum tubes in Furusawa’s research team to construct a ‘circuit board’ of Dr Nicolas Menicucci and, ordinary computers with components more than 10,000 quantum systems - an increase of three above right, his experiment. that can be mass produced,” said Dr orders of magnitude over the nearest competing design. Nicolas Menicucci, from the University’s School of Physics. “This experiment now holds the world record for the largest “The scalability afforded by transistors enabled the explosion quantum resource ever produced in which every part can be in computing technology we’ve seen in the last 65 years.” accessed directly and individually, which is essential if it is to “This breakthrough promises scalable design of laser-light be useful for quantum computing.” quantum computing hardware.” he says. Dr Menicucci stressed that work remains to be done. “To A theoretical physicist, Dr Menicucci proposed the take advantage of this breakthrough in scalability, we’ll experimental design, which was realised by researchers at need further breakthroughs in the precise control of these the University of Tokyo, led by Professor Akira Furusawa. A devices. This is the next step.” journal article in Nature Photonics has just been published on the research. HEADLINE BiofuEL HEAD OF School REpoRT 2014 is set to be another big year TEchnoloGY for the School of Physics. As I DEVElopED at thE write these words in mid February, the site for the new AIN building is School OF Physics a hive of activity. It will be exciting to watch the building grow over the Wins PRIZE coming months. Meanwhile, the business of teaching and research is By TOM GoRDON continuing apace. A new cohort of students have arrived and enrolment numbers look very healthy PhD student Clara Tran and Professor David Students are the lifeblood of any university and it is McKenzie from the very pleasing that we continue to attract a large crop of University of Sydney, extremely talented and motivated scientists-in-the-making. School of Physics At the end of last year we said farewell to two key members have presented an oral of the School’s administrative staff. Jane Conway left her presentation at the Bioenergy Australia Conference, an position as School Administration Manager to take up a new organisation that combines Industry, Universities and position as General Manager of the Learning & Teaching CSIRO to promote the use of and research into biofuels Unit at UNSW. This is an exciting opportunity for Jane and and won the prize for the best poster presentation. she goes with our best wishes and our thanks for doing a The paper was on the use of immobilised enzymes in terrific job over the past 18 months, during which she helped second generation cellulosic ethanol production, in to see the School through a time of significant change. which waste cellulose is converted to ethanol. We also said a sad farewell to Alex Green (née Viglienzone), A continuous simultaneous saccharification (the who was with the School for nearly 11 years. Alex gave process of breaking complex carbohydrates into simple outstanding administrative support in many areas, especially sugars) and fermentation process will allow the reuse of in the running of the Foundation and the International enzymes and yeast cells in bioreactors together with the Science Schools. She was also the editor of this newsletter, recycling of unreacted intermediates, potentially reduces which has now passed into the able hands of Tom Gordon, the production cost. In a continuous flow, enzymes our Science Communicator. Alex is moving to work in the and yeast cells are easily washed out unless they are University’s Office of the General Counsel and goes with our immobilized on carriers which can be retained inside the deep thanks and best wishes. reactors. This motivates the investigation of enzymes I am pleased to advise that Bernard Pailthorpe has been and yeast cells immobilized on polymers using Plasma awarded the title of Honorary Professor. Bernard was a immersion ion implantation (PII) treatment. staff member of the School (1993--2002), including as “Enzyme cost and efficiency are currently the Director of the VisLab facility. His interests include high main bottleneck for second generation bioethanol performance computing and mathematical modelling, and it technology,” said Ms Tran. is terrific to welcome him back. “Our technology, developed in the School, for Professor Ross McPhedran has retired after a long and immobilising enzymes using plasmas has attracted distinguished career. Ross has been at the School for the attention of the big players internationally,” says well over 35 years, and I am delighted to announce that Professor McKenzie. the University Senate has conferred upon him the title of Professor Emeritus. We look forward to Ross’s continued The blended fuel E10 is losing market share to the involvement with the School over the coming years. Indeed, much more expensive and fully imported Premium it is notable that the majority of retired academic staff unleaded petrol. The reasons are hard to explain, but continue to have close associations with the School as are associated with public perception and the disparate honorary staff members and to make valuable contributions policies of the states. A consequence is that our excess in research, teaching and student supervision. I think this ethanol production is exported. says a lot about the School of Physics as an enjoyable and Italy has the world’s first commercial second generation stimulating place to work. ethanol plant and initial results are very promising (www. Best wishes for a happy, healthy and succesful 2014 to all betarenewables.com). China is producing enzymes for our staff, students, alumni and friends. biofuels and will be a big biofuel producer in the future, challenging the USA and Brazil, the world’s largest TIM BEDDING, HEAD, School OF Physics biofuel manufacturing and consuming nations. 2 School OF Physic taKES INSPIRE-inG fiRst stEP toWARDS satEllitE launch By TOM GoRDON The i-INSPIRE nano-satellite is a Sydney University collaboration with plans to launch into space in 2013. The antenna seen here is made from metal measuring tape. This makes it very easy to cut to the correct length. A team lead by Professor Iver Cairns from the School of are able to design and build instruments that can operate at Physics has successfully launched a test satellite payload on extreme altitudes. a weather balloon. i-INSPIRE’s balloon flight, which was Project Horus’s 30th The team includes many staff and students from the flight, also carried a University of Sydney materials science faculties of Physics and Engineering and aims to be the first payload (Drs Alexey Kondyurin and Marcela Bilek), and completely university student satellite launched in Australia. advanced GPS tracking systems developed by Project i-INSPIRE stands for initial Integrated Spectrograph Imaging Horus. and Radiation Explorer and through leadership and expertise “We have close collaborations with NASA Goddard and from the University of Sydney, will demonstrate satellite the Kavli Institute Santa Barbara who are heavily involved capability, novel instrumentation, global radiation and space in space launches. They see our program as both novel weather and spectrograph radiation testing. and interesting. Australians are leading the way in the Professor Iver Cairns, leader of the i-INSPIRE team said development of a new generation of ultra-compact, high “We are happy to report a successful balloon test to 27 km performance, photonics-based instruments,” said Professor altitude for the engineering model of University of Sydney’s Bland-Hawthorn i-INSPIRE spacecraft with the aid of Project Horus, experts “i-INSPIRE’s balloon flight is a major step towards launching in high latitude balloon launches. into space. As such the test is a step towards Australian The payload weighed less than 700 gm in mass, i-INSPIRE universities and institutions developing space capabilities,” carries a fully photonic spectrograph Nanospec, an imager, said Professor Cairns. and multiple satellite subsystems. A full set of Nanospec These tests and launches will enable the team to take part, and imager data was obtained via