Quantum Zone at the 2025 MSU SciFest

The LHQS had a great time participating in the 2025 year's MSU Scifest!!

Approximately 500 kids of all ages attended the MSU SciFest Quantum Zone.

This year we coordinated with other MSU quantum research groups from Physics, Engineering, CMSE, and Chemistry to create the Quantum Zone. The interactive event comprised a half a dozen booths where kids and grownups learned about low-temperature quantum phenomena (high-temperature superconductivity, cryogenics & magnetic levitation), "laser radios", water waveguides, semiconductors, and python-based quantum computing coding exercises.

Each booth had hands-on activities and demos for SciFest guests. Kids would go from booth to booth in a quantum scavenger hunt, engage in the activities, and fill out a worksheet to reveal a "secret quantum code word" to win a Schrödinger cat prize!

Over the two-day event we had approximately 500 kids complete the activities ... and we nearly ran out of prizes!

It was a fantastic event and members from the LHQS got the opportunity to interact with folks in the local mid-Michigan community and tell them about all the cool quantum science going on at MSU.

Schrödinger cat prizes were awarded for successfully completing the quantum scavenger hunt!

Good vibrations: LHQS physicists investigate phononic open quantum acoustic systems

Left: Schematic of the hybrid quantum acoustic system used in this work. Right: Image of the hybrid flip-chip device located in a three dimensional microwave cavity used for coherent control and readout of the hybrid device.

Interactions between a quantum system and its environment typically lead to unwanted decoherence and dissipation. However, if the environmental degrees of freedom can be sufficiently well understood, or even engineered, dissipation can be harnessed for the preparation and manipulation of such open quantum systems. This type of quantum bath engineering has recently been leveraged in a broad class of systems including neutral atoms and trapped ions, optomechanical devices and superconducting qubits. Quantum acoustic systems, in which superconducting qubits are coupled to quantized mechanical degrees of freedom, offer a unique paradigm for open quantum systems research and quantum information processing.

New research from the LHQS published in Nature Communications, investigates a novel open quantum system composed of a superconducting transmon qubit coupled to a piezoelectric surface acoustic wave resonator. In this hybrid quantum system we are able to engineer dissipation in the form of tailor-made phononic loss to control quantum information states of the qubit.

You can also read a MSUToday write up about this work here: https://msutoday.msu.edu/news/2023/good-vibrations-quantum-computing