Quantum News Nexus

Monarch Quantum, a San Diego-based company that describes itself as “specializing in integrated photonics systems for quantum computing, quantum sensing, and quantum communications,” recently announced that its Quantum Light Engines subsystems will be used in NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) Quantum Gravity Gradiometer Pathfinder (QGGPf) mission.

This bit of news follows a press release last month from Infleqtion, stating that company’s “role as a collaborator” for the QGGPf mission, which represents the first planned space deployment of a quantum gravity gradiometer, a neutral-atom quantum sensor designed to measure minute variations in Earth’s gravitational field from orbit.

Infleqtion’s announcement also named a handful of other parties involved in the project, including Monarch Quantum, though it did not elaborate on Monarch’s role. Monarch said in its own press release that Infleqtion “will integrate Monarch Quantum’s laser-optical subsystems into the quantum core of the gravity sensor.”

Monarch added that such sensors “rely on highly stable laser and photonics control systems with sub-milliradian alignment stability to cool, trap, and manipulate neutral atoms.” The company also said that while constraints related to size, weight, power, and environmental sensitivity have limited the ability of neutral-atom quantum sensors to achieve the ultra-stable laser frequency control and phase coherence required for space deployment, its Quantum Light Engines subsystems and assemblies solve these issue by integrating:

• Multiple chip-scale lasers
• Hundreds of precision optical components
• Low-noise control electronics
• Advanced thermal and mechanical stabilization
• Factory-aligned, sealed photonics packaging into a single, ruggedized module engineered for space deployment.

“We are honored to support this historic mission and to serve our teammates in advancing space-based quantum sensing,” said Dr. Timothy Day, Chairman and CEO of Monarch Quantum. “The QGGPf mission represents a major milestone in U.S. leadership in quantum gravity sensing and precision measurement from orbit. We are proud to collaborate with NASA JPL here in Southern California, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Infleqtion, and our industry partners to help enable the first planned space deployment of a quantum gravity gradiometer.”

As previously noted, the QGGPf mission is expected to launch around 2030.

Image: Illustration of quantum gravity sensing from space. (Source: Infleqtion)

Quantum News Nexus is a site from freelance writer and editor Dan O’Shea that covers quantum computing, quantum sensing, quantum networking, quantum-safe security, and more. You can find him on X @QuantumNewsGuy and doshea14@gmail.com.