Atom Computing describes itself as “a company obsessed with building the world’s most

scalable quantum computers out of optically trapped neutral atoms.” The company recently
revealed it had spent the past two years secretly building a quantum computer using Strontium
atoms as its units of computation. 

Headquartered in Berkeley, California, Benjamin Bloom and Jonathan King founded the
company in 2018 with $5M in seed funds. Bloom received his PhD in physics from the
University of Colorado, while King received a PhD in chemical engineering from California
Berkeley.

Atom Computing received $15M in Series A funding from investors Venrock, Innovation

Endeavors, and Prelude Ventures earlier this year. The company also received three grants from
the National Science Foundation. 

Atom Staff

Atom Computing

Rob Hays, a former Intel, and Lenovo executive was recently named CEO of the company. Atom
Computing’s staff of quantum physicists and design engineers fully complements quantum-
related disciplines and applications. This month Atom Computing signaled its continued
momentum by adding two quantum veterans to key positions within the company:

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 Denise Ruffner was named Chief Business Officer, responsible for the company’s
strategic customer and partner ecosystem and business development engagements. Denise
was previously with IonQ and IBM Quantum. 
 Justin Ging joined Atom as its Chief Product Officer. He will lead product management
and customer experience for Atom Computing’s solutions portfolio. Justin was
previously with Honeywell Quantum Solutions, where he led commercialization and
business development for its quantum business unit.

Qubit technologies

While traditional computers use magnetic bits to represent a one or a zero for computation,
quantum computers use quantum bits or qubits to represent a one or a zero or simultaneously any
number in between. 

Today’s quantum computers use several different technologies for qubits. But regardless of the
technology, a common requirement for all quantum computing qubits is that it must be scalable,
high quality, and capable of fast quantum interaction with each other.

IBM uses superconducting qubits on its huge fleet of about twenty quantum computers.
Although Amazon doesn’t yet have a quantum computer, it plans to build one using
superconducting hardware. Honeywell and IonQ both use trapped-ion qubits made from a rare
earth metal called ytterbium. In contrast, Psi Quantum and Xanadu use photons of light. 

Atom computing chose to use different technology - nuclear-spin qubits made from neutral
atoms. Phoenix, the name of Atom’s first-generation, gate-based quantum computer platform,
uses 100 optically trapped qubits. 

Atom Computing’s quantum platform

First-Generation Quantum Computer, “Phoenix”, Berkeley,

Atom Computing

The Phoenix platform uses a specific type of nuclear-spin qubits created from an isotope of
Strontium, a naturally occurring element. Strontium is a neutral atom. At the atomic level,
neutral atoms have equal numbers of protons and electrons. However, isotopes of Strontium have
varying numbers of neutrons. These differences in neutrons produce different energy levels in
the atom. Atom Computing uses the isotope Strontium-87 and takes advantage of its unique
energy levels to create spin qubits.

Qubits need to remain in a quantum state long enough to complete computations. The length of
time that a qubit can retain its quantum state is its coherence time. Since Atom Computing’s
neutral atom qubits are natural rather than manufactured, no adjustments are needed to
compensate for differences between qubits. That contributes to its stability and relatively long
coherence time in a range greater than 40 seconds compared to a millisecond for
superconducting or a few seconds for ion-trapping systems. Moreover, a neutral atom has little
affinity for other atoms, making the qubits less susceptible to noise. 

Neutral atom qubits offer many advantages that make them suitable for quantum computing.
Here are just a few:

 Natural qubits are all perfect. Every qubit is identical to all others of the same species
 High connectivity among qubits
 Potential to rapidly scale to very large numbers of qubits 
 Flexible geometry of arrays
 High coherence times
 Wireless control by lasers in free space
 Optical tweezers are scalable allowing for easy mobility 
 Proven science over decades of physics research – this atom type is used to power the
most accurate atomic clock

How neutral atom quantum processors work

Atom Computing

Atom Computing
The Phoenix quantum platform uses lasers as proxies for high-precision, wireless control of the
Strontium-87 qubits. Atoms are trapped in a vacuum chamber using optical tweezers
controlled by lasers at very specific wavelengths, creating an array of highly stable qubits
captured in free space.

First, a beam of hot strontium moves the atoms into the vacuum chamber. Next, multiple lasers
bombard each atom with photons to slow their momentum to a near motionless state, causing its
temperature to fall to near absolute zero. This process is called laser cooling and it eliminates the
requirement for cryogenics and makes it easier to scale qubits.

Then, optical tweezers are formed in a glass vacuum chamber, where qubits are assembled and
optically trapped in an array. One advantage of neutral atoms is that the processor’s array is not
limited to any specific shape, and it can be either 2D or 3D. Additional lasers create a quantum
interaction between the atoms (called entanglement) in preparation for the actual computation.
After initial quantum states are set and circuits are established, then the computation is
performed.