by Amara Graps
It’s an inspiring vision: “Teleportation Across Canada.” The mission statement for the quantum communication QEYSSat v.2.0 project is to connect Canada, a mari usque ad mare, from Sea to Sea. Canada’s ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making Canada the world’s second-largest country by total area (~9.98 million square km) with the world’s longest coastline. Its border with the United States is the world’s longest international land border.
The First Step
The first step in Canada’s large quantum communication vision, is its Quantum EncrYption and Science Satellite (QEYSSat), a technology and science demonstration microsatellite, which is currently about one year away from launch. A recent summary of QEYSSat’s mission goals was provided by Katanya B. Kuntz, Science Team Coordinator for QEYSSat, in a Quantum Security and Defense Working Group meeting on October 22, 2024.
- Microsatellite (<100 kg) orbiting in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO), with quantum Uplink channel, to the satellite’s 25 cm Quantum Receiver Primary Payload (4-state Polarization Analyzer, 780nm-795 passband).
- There is a recently added quantum downlink source at 850nm for REFQ project, University of Calgary receiver Quantum Ground Stations (QGS)
- QEYSSat will link to multiple quantum sources on the ground, for testing various Ground-to-Space links (ground fiber networks, link to ground-based atomic memory, quantum dot, single photon source, …)
- Demonstration for quantum links and space QKD: in Canada + globally, using multiple national and international QGSs. See next Figure for Canada’s national components.
- Mission Objective is to distribute keys between two QGSs, at least 400 km apart. The primary QGS is at the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and the secondary QGS at Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC).
- Transmitter telescopes are ‘compact’, the IQC has portable ground stations, that were used in the airborne demo.
- Study of quantum links, Entanglement in Relativistic settings, new science demonstrations, Adaptive Optics capabilities, …
- Technology Readiness Levels (TRLs) of QEYSSat components are at level 6, upon integration for the QEYSSat spacecraft (see Figure 24 in Jennewein et al., 2024).
- QEYSSat projected Launch in late 2025.
QEYSSat: Most Deeply Scoped Quantum Satellite Mission, Ever
In her October 22 talk, Katanya Kuntz showed a slide of the QEYSSat Payload Prototype, with basic stats: 23kg, Power < 30W, envelope ~60 cm^3. She listed as tests completed: radiation, thermal vacuum chamber (TVAC), outdoor and aircraft links, with research results in five references.
However, a look to the QEYSSat project’s experience shows 20 research publications going back to 2011, with a project director: Thomas Jennewein, whose experience at the University of Vienna was under Nobel Prize winner and quantum communication expert: Anton Zeilinger, including Zeilinger’s collaboration on the successful Chinese Micius quantum satellite.
Despite its smaller size compared to Micius and the in-preparation ESA satellite: Eagle-1, the skills embedded inside of the QEYSSat microsatellite project are notable. The Canadian Space Agency should market this satellite in its rightful place as world-class. I prepared a list of other quantum satellites, where we see that there is now a race-to-launch between Eagle-1 and QEYSSat.
| Launch Date | Mission | Size | Country sponsor(s) |
| 2014. 24 May | SOCRATES | 50kg | Japan |
| 2015. 16 Dec | Galassia | 3U | Singapore |
| 2016. 16 Aug | Micius | 600kg | China |
| 2015-2020 Unfunded by the European Commission in H2020 FET project proposal | CQuCoM | UK, Singapore, Germany, Austria, Italy, Netherlands | |
| 2019. 17 Jun | SpooQy-1 | 3U | Singapore, UK, Switzerland |
| 2024 ? | QUARC? ROKS? | 6U 3kg | UK |
| 2024. 16 Aug | Qube | 3U | Germany |
| 2025? | Quick-3 | 3U | Germany |
| 2025 | Qube-2 | 6U | Germany |
| 2025 ? | SpeQtre | 12U | UK, Singapore |
| 2025-late -2026-early | QEYSSat | 23 kg | Canada, UK |
| 2025-late -2026-early | EAGLE-1 | 300 kg | ESA (20 European partners) |
| 2026 ? | OPS-SAT VOLT | 16U | UK, ESA |
| 2026 | SpeQtral-1 | 16U | Singapore |
| 2026 | M2.0 TestBed/LEO | 2 CubeSats | USA/NASA |
From Sea to Sea to Sea
Jennewein et al., 2024 QEYSSat v2.0 is an 89-page (108-page at arXiv) white paper that builds in the QEYSSat first mission, while laying out in detail a broad, long-term, Canadian national quantum communication strategy. This white paper goes beyond this first space satellite step. For the depth and breadth of quantum communication knowledge, this white paper should be in every quantum communication expert’s library. The white paper is also a Master Class in engagement with the quantum communication experts, which I’ll continue, in Part 2 of this article.
One goal of the QEYSSat v.2.0 strategy popped out in my reading in the White Paper’s vision, in section 7.3.1, just before listing eight detailed communication goals:
“This QEYSSat 2.0 mission concept should provide the means to establish secure quantum keys that, first of all, cover ALL of Canada. Any ground station site at Point-A to any Point-B shall be connectable, and the accessible area stretches from coast to coast to coast.”
Don’t miss the section 5.8.3 with their description of underwater quantum communication, as well:
“[…] as we move to optical wavelengths when exploring QKD channels between ground and satellite, we open the door to incorporating underwater channels where blue-green wavelengths can be transmitted for hundreds of meters which is enough to establish a channel between submarines while they remain submerged.”
I’d like to remind our readers that ‘ALL of Canada’ would include its Arctic islands archipelago, see the next Figure. Here is an opportunity for Canada to be a world leader in quantum communication in the most northern regions too. The climate change mitigations by all friendly Arctic countries will need good communication.
As for the first-largest country, Russia (~17.10 square km), it is just on the other side of the Arctic Sea from Canada. Reliable and secure communication will be needed to support the West’s counter measures to the aggressive geopolitics of Russia, whose motto is ‘I Have No Border’. If you’re not yet convinced how important is communication to Russia, remember how quickly into the Coup: by August 26, 1991, Yeltsin transferred USSR communication to be under his control, and see how Elon Musk’s Starlinks are now freely available on Russia’s open market for its military communication in its war against Ukraine, on Ukraine’s front line (Washington Post).
That leads to one of the most economically impactful, in a FTQC period, Use Cases of Quantum Technology for cybersecurity and defense: Satellite quantum communications. GQI has you covered. See the next Figure.
The first steps for today’s Quantum Safe communication includes foundational and increasingly sophisticated technologies, growing in economic impact. For the near-term, one can implement the first layer of a multilayer defense to secure trusted nodes with post-quantum cryptography.
In a previous QCR report, we described the different quantum communication visions of the Quantum Internet. GQI’s Quantum Safe Outlook Report and corresponding Quantum Safe State of Play Presentation (*), explains the journey to build the Quantum Internet, with the Network-led approaches, and the Compute-led approaches, with all of its intermediate steps. A broad quantum communication strategy to connect the second largest country on the planet (yes, we are looking at you Canada), would necessarily include the intermediate steps.
Quantum Safe communication emerges in a number of Use Case themes, depending on quantum technology’s incremental successes. In timelines, these are denoted as NISQ, ‘true’ NISQ, ‘early’ FTQC, and so on. For the Telecommunications Use Cases, large-scale QKD networks are a high economic impact Use Case in a future time, when FTQC, with modest speedups has become practical. For the Automotive and Aerospace Use Cases, specialized QKD communication links are an advanced quantum technology in a future time frame between ‘true’ NISQ and ‘early’ FTQC.
I’ll continue extracting examples from the QEYSSat v.2.0 white paper in Part 2, to discuss the ‘Low Hanging Fruit of Experience’.
(*) Quantum Safe Outlook Report. Despite the challenges, the transition to quantum-safe cryptography is essential to ensure the security of our digital infrastructure in the future. Organizations that start planning now will be well-positioned to meet this challenge. If you are interested to learn more, please don’t hesitate to contact info@global-qi.com.
November 2, 2024