JILA

World-leading Physics Research Institute | Equal parts @CUBoulder and @NIST | not an acronym

[JILA @JILAscience]

Jun Ye has been named a 2026 Wolf Prize laureate in Physics! 🏆

Ye shares the prize with Immanuel Bloch, Max Planck Institute for "transformative, widely applicable advances in the control of ultracold atomic systems."

Read more: https://t.co/s317VjrO6w

@CUBoulderPhys @NIST @CUBoulder

[CU Boulder Physics @CUBoulderPhys]

Turns out 100 years of physics PhDs at @cuboulder is a pretty good reason to celebrate ⚛️🎉

Check out a few highlights from the weekend and more on our website ➡️

📸 credit: Zach Ulibarri (NPL tour); Glenn Asakawa (industry and Nobel panels)

[CU Boulder 🦬 @CUBoulder]

Big news for the future of quantum research!

The @NSF is investing in the next phase of CU Boulder and its partners’ work to advance quantum science research and engineering through a $37.5 million award.

Read more ↓
https://t.co/RFGl4LkWCK

[Physical Review X @PhysRevX]

Using Lieb-Mattis states, a new entanglement-enhanced protocol for differential phase sensing in two-node quantum sensor networks is immune to common-mode noise but robust to local imperfections. The work introduces a unitary and dissipative protocol.

🔗 https://t.co/Kj0flaCdPQ

[CU Boulder Physics @CUBoulderPhys]

Congratulations to @CUBoulder’s Margaret Murnane – named an honorary member of @OpticaWorldwide! 🎉

Image credit: Boulder Daily Camera

@CUEngineering | @JILAscience

Read more: https://t.co/lUyH6KzBqR

[JILA @JILAscience]

Science in action at JILA 🔬✨

Last week, more than 110 high school students put their research on display at the annual PISEC High School Poster Symposium! Students connected with CU mentors, toured labs, and practiced science communication skills.

The future of STEM is bright 🌟

Read more: https://t.co/xMHLTCdPID
@CUBoulder @CUBoulderPhys

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA Fellow and @CUBoulder Prof. Jun Ye has been elected a Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious honorary societies.

Congratulations, Prof. Ye! 👏

Read more: https://t.co/Rlvs2NkTWX

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA researchers have proposed a new superradiant laser design for next‑generation “active” atomic clocks that overcomes two major challenges: atom heating and vibration sensitivity. Their findings were recently published in @PhysRevLett.

Read more: https://t.co/Y40Txlb8rZ

[JILA @JILAscience]

Congratulations to @CUBoulder physics graduate student Anya Grafov for being selected as one of only 16 global recipients of the 2026 @ZontaIntl Women in STEM Award! 🎉

Read more: https://t.co/1lofM5s1Cx

@CUBoulderPhys | @GradBuffs

[JILA @JILAscience]

Congratulations to JILA postdoctoral researcher Megan Bentley on being selected as a 2026 Arnold O. Beckman Postdoctoral Fellow from the @BeckmanFnd – one of just 18 researchers nationwide to receive this fellowship!🎉

Learn more about Megan and her work: https://t.co/7ewLbCYGxS

@lewandoh | @CUBoulder | @CUBoulderPhys

[JILA @JILAscience]

Exciting quantum news: @GoogleQuantumAI has named JILA fellow and @CUBoulder physics prof. Adam Kaufman to lead a new neutral atom quantum computing hardware team!

More: https://t.co/81g0eR62rL

@CUBoulderPhys

[Google Quantum AI @GoogleQuantumAI]

Google Quantum AI is expanding to include neutral atom research with our superconducting program. Complementary paths will accelerate our mission to build a large-scale, error-corrected quantum computer—an engineering challenge we are excited to tackle. https://t.co/nSV5VTi5v7

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA Fellow and @CUBoulder Professor Dana Anderson is celebrating a major milestone as @infleqtion, the quantum technology company he founded, officially went public on the New York Stock Exchange! 📈

Read more: https://t.co/OTGsN4XT6G

Image credit: Infleqtion

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA researchers, working with collaborators in Germany, have demonstrated that new crystalline mirror coatings can dramatically reduce atomic‑level noise inside optical cavities, allowing lasers to reach record‑breaking frequency stability.

Read more: https://t.co/asUHhNZcg1

@CUBoulder | @NIST | @CUArtsSciences | @CUBoulderNews

[JILA @JILAscience]

@theNAEng Congratulations! 👏

[JILA @JILAscience]

Congratulations to Dana Anderson, JILA Fellow and Professor of @CUBoulderPhys and @CUEngineering, on his election to the National Academy of Engineering! 🎉

Read more: https://t.co/B79vzBjtLD

@CUBoulder | @CUArtsSciences | @CUEngineering | @infleqtion | @theNAEng

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA researchers just took a major step toward next‑gen nuclear clocks. In a new @Nature study, @JunYeJILA's team tracked thorium‑doped crystals for nearly a year and found remarkably stable nuclear transitions—key for ultra‑precise, compact clocks.

Read more: https://t.co/W7jkeqo2up

@NIST | @CUBoulder | @CUBoulderPhys | @CUArtsSciences

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA is proud to announce that Dr. Kai Li, a researcher in the Jun Ye Group, has been named the recipient of the 2026 @EuropeanXFEL Young Scientist Award. This prestigious honor is awarded annually to an early-career scientist who has made exceptional contributions through experiments conducted at the European X-ray Free-Electron Laser (XFEL), one of the world’s most advanced facilities for probing matter on atomic length and time scales.

https://t.co/3NQ24fV54J

[JILA @JILAscience]

JILA & NIST Fellow Jun Ye named a Clarivate Highly Cited Researcher for the 12th consecutive year—placing him among the top 1% of scientists worldwide.

His work in precision measurement & quantum science continues to shape the future.

https://t.co/mtbKgFn4dD

[JILA @JILAscience]

A team led by JILA and @NIST Fellow Jun Ye has demonstrated a new way to boost clock precision using quantum entanglement. By making atoms "tick" in tighter unison, they’ve reduced the randomness that typically limits time measurement.
Their breakthrough surpasses the Standard Quantum Limit (SQL)—a fundamental threshold in quantum physics—thanks to a method called spin entanglement. This advancement could enhance technologies like GPS, and deepen our understanding of gravity and the universe itself.
https://t.co/yOR4ZTB3Gq

[Physical Review Letters @PhysRevLett]

An entanglement-enhanced optical clock achieves unprecedented precision of 10⁻¹⁸ with 2dB quantum noise squeezing https://t.co/pMmXGmZltn