Scientists have created a new kind of artificial atom that is stable at room temperature, opening up new possibilities in secure quantum communications.

In a new paper in the journal Nano Letter, scientists at the University of Oregon (UO) show how they used white graphene to create artificial atoms that remain stable at room temperature, opening up a new avenue to explore in the development of secure quantum communications and optical quantum computing.

"The big breakthrough is that we've discovered a simple, scalable way to nanofabricate artificial atoms onto a microchip, and that the artificial atoms work in air and at room temperature," said University of Oregon physicist Benjamin Alemán, co-author of the paper and member of UO's Materials Science Institute.

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