Cerfe Labs awarded USD 1.15 M Phase II Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) contract by the Department of Energy

        September 26, 2022

        Cerfe Labs has received a phase II  Small Business Innovation Research grant (SBIR) from The Department of Energy’s Office of Science for research into Quantum Information Science (QIS) applications for CeRAM.   This research grant will continue Cerfe Labs’  development of CeRAM for quantum-adjacent memory.

        Dr. Saurabh Suryavanshi of Cerfe Labs will be the Principal Investigator of the project. Cerfe Labs will be collaborating with Professor Daniel Dessau of the  University of Colorado at Boulder (Department of Physics, Center of Experiments on Quantum Materials, JILA, and RASEI). During the project, Cerfe Labs will also receive commercialization help from Mr. Dave Eggleston of Intuitive Cognition Consulting.

        During phase I of the project, Cerfe Labs and the University of Colorado demonstrated CeRAM operation down to 870 mK with excellent retention and pulsed endurance. This additional DOE funding will continue work towards the goal of a 16 kB product operating at extreme cryogenic operation including quantum-adjacent classical memory.  This Phase II project will develop high-quality films for smaller devices, lower power and higher speed operations and will begin array and packaging development suitable for cryogenic temperatures. A successful product will also support additional cryogenic applications such as ultra-high-resolution IR sensors, space electronics, and cryogenic supercomputing. No memory has successfully addressed these ultra-low temperature applications. This work will further add experimental evidence that CeRAM is a true correlated electron device with the potential to deliver on these needs.

        “During Phase I of the project we confirmed that CeRAM holds significant promise as a memory device that can operate at cryogenic temperatures currently not served by any microelectronic memory technology.   I am happy to continue my collaboration with Cerfe Labs for more thorough materials and device development and electronic/cryogenic measurements ”, said Prof. Dessau.

        “We are grateful to the Department of Energy for the opportunity to study our CeRAM technology for use in cryogenic and quantum computing applications, and we are very happy to continue our relationship with Professor Dessau, who we worked with while at Arm on a CeRAM contract for DARPA’s Electronics Resurgence Initiative”, said Eric Hennenhoefer, CEO, Cerfe Labs