The National Science Foundation (NSF) has announced a webinar on Quantum Leap Challenge Institutes (QLCI). The webinar will take place March 13th from 3:30 PM to 4:30 PM Eastern Standard Time and will provide an overview of the QLCI program.
The QLCIs are a part of the Quantum Leap, one of NSF’s 10 Big Ideas. The Quantum Leap focuses on “exploiting quantum mechanics to observe, manipulate, and control the behavior of particles and energy at atomic and subatomic scales, resulting in next-generation technologies for sensing, computing, modeling, and communicating.” NSF will invest $30 million in Quantum Leap through various programs, including the QLCIs, in 2019.
Overview
Quantum Leap Challenge Institutes (QLCI) are large-scale interdisciplinary research projects that aim to advance the frontiers of quantum information science and engineering. Research at these Institutes will span the focus areas of quantum computation, quantum communication, quantum simulation, and/or quantum sensing. The institutes are expected to foster multidisciplinary approaches to specific scientific, technological, and educational workforce development goals in these fields. Two types of awards will be supported under this program: (i) 12-month Conceptualization Grants (CGs) to support teams envisioning subsequent Institute proposals and (ii) 5-year Challenge Institute (CI) awards to establish and operate Quantum Leap Challenge Institutes. This webinar will provide an overview of the QLCI program and will address questions submitted in advance.
How to Submit Questions
Participants may submit questions about QLCI proposal development and submission by sending e-mail to: QLCI@nsf.gov. Questions received by March 8, 2019 will be given first priority for inclusion in the webinar.
Registration and Access to the Webinar
Participants should register (and may do so in advance) at the web page
https://nsf2.webex.com/nsf2/onstage/g.php?MTID=eada3ee61e1de8107637f481118ebe712
WebEx Event Password: QLCIwebinar@2019
The Computing Community Consortium (CCC) has also been heavily involved in the quantum space recently. In November 2018, the CCC released a workshop report on Quantum Computing: Computer Science’s Role (now available in a Japanese translation), and in January 2019, the CCC held a workshop on Post Quantum Cryptography (PQC). With the looming threat of quantum computing systems that will be able to break current cryptographic systems, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has actively led a PQC standardization effort since December of 2016. The CCC’s PQC workshop brought together researchers in various subdomains of cryptography to identify and address the challenges in PQC migration and workshop report is in progress.
To learn more about the QLCI webinar, visit the NSF webpage.
