2019 Laureate Profile: Professor Andrew Dzurak
Professor Andrew Dzurak
Administering Organisation: The University of New South Wales
Discipline area: Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry and Earth Sciences
Fellowship project summary:
FL190100167: The project aims to develop a quantum computer processor based on a new technology developed by Professor Dzurak in 2014-15. Remarkably, the qubits, or processing elements, utilise the silicon metal-oxide semiconductor field-effect transistors that constitute today’s microprocessor chips, so existing production plants can be used to fast-track development. The project will realise proof-of-principle systems with 10-20 qubits, to resolve critical issues related to readout, error correction, and long-distance on-chip coupling, to take the technology to a commercial-ready stage. Quantum computing is one of the great scientific challenges of this century, with important applications in pharmaceutical design, finance and national security.
Australian Research Council funding: $2,895,366
About Professor Dzurak
Andrew Dzurak is a Scientia Professor in the School of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications at the University of New South Wales, a Chief Investigator and member of the Centre Executive at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, and is Director of ANFF-NSW, the NSW node of the Australian National Fabrication Facility.
Professor Dzurak’s key areas of research are quantum computation technology and silicon nanoelectronics. Professor Dzurak has been working on silicon qubit concepts for over 20 years, having co-invented 11 patent families, and has published 18 papers in the prestigious Nature and Science suite of journals related to this research. He leads a team of researchers focused on silicon qubit development at UNSW that is funded by the Australian Research Council, the US Army Research Office, the NSW State Government, and the start-up company Silicon Quantum Computing.
For his achievements, Professor Dzurak was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of New South Wales in 2015 and was awarded the NSW Science & Engineering Award for Excellence in Engineering and Information and Communications Technologies in 2012 and the 2011 Eureka Prize for Scientific Research.
Find out more about Professor Dzurak’s research by visiting his profile page on The University of New South Wales website. For further information about this funding scheme, please visit the Australian Laureate Fellowships scheme page on the ARC website.
Image credit: Dan White