Eighteen research projects are jointly awarded more than 16 million euros for technological research on photonic chips. The funding comes from NWO and the National Growth Fund programme PhotonDelta. This investment will enable the development of new photonic technologies that form the basis for applications in medical technology, sustainable AI and wireless communication, among others.
Photonic chips working with light particles are a lot more energy-efficient, faster and have more capacity than (traditional) electronic chips. Because of this enormous potential, integrated photonics is one of the ten priority technologies from the Dutch government's National Technology Strategy (NTS).
With this research programme, NWO and PhotonDelta aim to stimulate research into innovative materials, components and systems within integrated photonics on new, promising themes that provide a valuable addition to the already existing projects at PhotonDelta.
NWO sees photonics as one of the important key technologies in the National Technology Strategy and has therefore added over 8 million euros to the budget from NWO's interest income and Technology Foundation STW's reserves. This is a one-off increase in the budget of this NGF-programme.
Tjerk Opmeer, Director Innovation at the Ministry of Economic Affairs:
The National Growth Fund stands for sustainable and structural economic development. Integrated photonics and its application plays an indispensable role in this respect. We are therefore very pleased that, thanks to funds from the PhotonDelta programme and NWO's contribution, 18 research projects can start. Projects that will ensure that the Netherlands takes another step forward in areas such as faster communication, more reliable health research and cleaner energy.
