David Awschalom is the Liew Family Professor and Vice Dean for Research of the Pritzker School for Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago, a Senior Scientist at Argonne National Laboratory, and Founding Director of the Chicago Quantum Exchange. He is also the inaugural Director of Q-NEXT, one of the US DOE Quantum Information Science Research Centers. He works in the fields of spintronics and quantum information engineering, exploring and controlling the spins of electrons, nuclei, and photons in semiconductors and molecules. His research includes implementations of information processing with potential applications in quantum computing, communication, and sensing.
Professor Awschalom received his BSc in physics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and his PhD in experimental physics from Cornell University. He was a research staff member and manager of the Nonequilibrium Physics Department at the IBM Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York. In 1991 he joined the University of California-Santa Barbara as a professor of physics, and in 2001 was additionally appointed as a professor of electrical and computer engineering. Prior to joining PME, he served as the Peter J. Clarke Professor and Director of the California NanoSystems Institute, and director of the Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation.
Professor Awschalom received the American Physical Society Oliver Buckley Prize and Julius Edgar Lilienfeld Prize, the European Physical Society Europhysics Prize, the Materials Research Society David Turnbull Award and Outstanding Investigator Prize, the AAAS Newcomb Cleveland Prize, the International Magnetism Prize from the International Union of Pure and Applied Physics, and an IBM Outstanding Innovation Award. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the European Academy of Sciences.
Awschalom Group explores optical and magnetic interactions in semiconductor quantum structures, spin dynamics and coherence in condensed matter systems, macroscopic quantum phenomena in nanometer-scale magnets, and implementations of quantum information processing in the solid state. He developed a variety of femtosecond-resolved spatiotemporal spectroscopies and micromagnetic sensing techniques aimed at exploring charge and spin motion in the quantum domain. These measurements resulted in the discovery of robust electron spin coherence, transport of coherent states, and the spin Hall effect in semiconductors.
Advancing Chemistry and Quantum Information Science: An Assessment of Research Opportunities at the Interface of Chemistry and Quantum Information Science in the United States
“Advancing Chemistry and Quantum Information Science: An Assessment of Research Opportunities at the Interface of Chemistry and Quantum Information Science in the United States,” National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, Washington, DC: The National Academies Press (2023). https://doi.org/10.17226/26850
Bias-pulsed atomic layer etching of 4H-silicon carbide producing subangstrom surface roughness
J. A. Michaels, N. Delegan, Y. Tsaturyan, J. R. Renzas, D. D. Awschalom, J. G. Eden, F. J. Heremans. Bias-pulsed atomic layer etching of 4H-silicon carbide producing subangstrom surface roughness. 2023. Journal of Vacuum Science & Technology A 41, 3, 032607. 10.1116/6.0002447
Detecting spin bath polarization with quantum quench phase shifts of single spins in diamond
P. C. Jerger, Y. Wang, M. Onizhuk, B. S. Soloway, M. T. Solomon, C. Egerstrom, F. J. Heremans, G. Galli, A. A. Clerk, D. D. Awschalom. Detecting spin bath polarization with quantum quench phase shifts of single spins in diamond. arXiv. 2023. 2303.02233.
Enhancing spin coherence in optically addressable molecular qubits through host-matrix control
S. L. Bayliss, P. Deb, D. W. Laorenza, M. Onizhuk, G. Galli, D. E. Freedman, D. D. Awschalom. Enhancing spin coherence in optically addressable molecular qubits through host-matrix control. Phys. Rev. X. 2022. Vol. 12. 10.1103/PhysRevX.12.031028.
Purcell enhancement of erbium ions in TiO2 on silicon nanocavities
A. M. Dibos, M. T. Solomon, S. E. Sullivan, M. K. Singh, K. E. Sautter, C. P. Horn, G. D. Grant, Y. Lin, J. Wen, F. J. Heremans, S. Guha, D. D. Awschalom. Purcell enhancement of erbium ions in TiO2 on silicon nanocavities. 2022. Nano Lett. 22, 16, 6530–6536. 10.1021/acs.nanolett.2c01561
A Roadmap for Quantum Interconnects
D. D. Awschalom, H. Bernien, R. Brown, A. Clerk, E. Chitambar, A. Dibos, J. Dionne, M. Eriksson, B. Fefferman, G. Fuchs, et al. A Roadmap for Quantum Interconnects. United States. 2022. https://doi.org/10.2172/1900586. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1900586.
Generalized scaling of spin qubit coherence in over 12,000 host materials
S. Kanai, F. J.Heremans, H. Seo, G. Wolfowicz, C. P. Anderson, S. E. Sullivan, M. Onizhuk, G. Galli, D. D. Awschalom, H. Ohno. Generalized scaling of spin qubit coherence in over 12,000 host materials. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2022. Vol. 119. 10.1073/pnas.2121808119.
Development of a Scalable Quantum Memory Platform -- Materials Science of Erbium-Doped TiO2 Thin Films on Silicon
M. K. Singh, G. Wolfowicz, J. Wen, S. E. Sullivan, A. Prakash, A. M. Dibos, D. D. Awschalom, F. J. Heremans, S. Guha. Development of a scalable quantum memory platform -- materials science of erbium-doped TiO2 thin films on silicon. arXiv. 2022. 2202.05376.
Five-second coherence of a single spin with single-shot readout in silicon carbide
C. P. Anderson, E. O. Glen, C. Zeledon, A. Bourassa, Y. Jin, Y. Zhu, C. Vorwerk, A. L. Crook, H. Abe, J. Ul-Hassan, T. Ohshima, N. T. Son, G. Galli, D. D. Awschalom. Five-second coherence of a single spin with single-shot readout in silicon carbide. 2022. Sci. Adv. Vol. 8. 10.1126/sciadv.abm5912.
Tunable and Transferable Diamond Membranes for Integrated Quantum Technologies
X. Guo, N. Delegan, J. C. Karsch, Z. Li, T. Liu, R. Shreiner, A. Butcher, D. D. Awschalom, F. J. Heremans, A. A. High. Tunable and Transferable Diamond Membranes for Integrated Quantum Technologies. 2021. Nano. Lett. 10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c03703.