A focused ion beam facility in Manchester is so oversubscribed that researchers currently wait four to six months for access, and demand is still growing. The bottleneck is a bespoke tool called P-NAME, which the University of Manchester team has used to become the world leader in isotopically enriching silicon—doping it with the isotope 28Si for quantum technology applications. The problem is that P-NAME was not designed for this enrichment work. The process is exceptionally slow, and it consumes roughly 45 percent of the instrument’s time, delaying other users. Other countries are now building dedicated systems to scale up the same capability, putting the UK’s lead at risk. The new Advanced Materials Enrichment and Synthesis (AMES) tool will be purpose-built for high-dose isotopic enrichment and localised synthesis of materials. By accelerating the enrichment process and freeing up P-NAME for other research, AMES should keep the UK at the forefront of quantum technology manufacturing. If successful, the work could help underpin future quantum computers, sensors, and secure communications—systems that rely on precisely engineered materials at the atomic scale.
View original technical description
ontext: The ability to functionalise advanced materials on the nanoscale, including enabling localised isotopic enrichment and purification, has been transformed through the development of a bespoke focused ion beam facility (P-NAME) at the University of Manchester (UoM). Open to UK (and international) users in academia and industry as part of the Henry Royce Institute, the demand for this internationally leading capability far exceeds our ability to deliver with a currently approved access requests subject to a ~4 to 6 month waiting time. This is continuing to grow as more research projects are requesting P-NAME time in research proposal submissions. Significant time (~45%) on P-NAME is dedicated to materials enrichment as a critical capability we have developed. Challenges Addressed: The enrichment of Si using isotopic 28Si doping for quantum technology (QT) applications has drawn exceptional international attention. The proof-of-concept demonstration of this has been delivered by the applicants using the P-NAME tool, placing the UK as the international lead. P-NAME is not designed for this work however, preventing its scale-up, and incurring substantial delays to other users as the process is exceptionally slow using the existing capability. This places the UK at risk of losing our lead as others develop dedicated systems for scaling this work. The Advanced Materials Enrichment and Synthesis (AMES) tool requested here will enable accelerated isotopic enrichment and localised synthesis of materials via high-dose focused ion beam implantation alongside ion doping of active species into these materials. In doing so AMES directly enables the scaling of the enrichment process and qubit doping, and releases highly contested time to users of P-NAME for other purposes.
Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.
Is something wrong? Let us know