AirTrunk has signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with Australian technology company Emergence Quantum to explore cryogenic cooling technologies that could be used in future data centres, including facilities designed to support quantum computing.
Under the agreement, the companies will assess whether cooling computer chips to extremely low temperatures can improve performance while reducing energy use. The work is also expected to examine whether cryogenic approaches could cut the amount of water required for data centre cooling.
In the release, AirTrunk said the collaboration would also look at whether cryogenic technologies could enable “giga-Watt power storage” to help manage intermittent renewable energy supply. The companies also referenced potential applications in carbon capture.
AirTrunk Vice President for Innovation and Intelligence Jose Castaneda said the partnership was aimed at exploring new approaches to data centre design as digital demand grows. “As digital demand grows, our responsibility is not only to provide the secure and resilient infrastructure our customers and communities rely on, but to find new ways to deliver that infrastructure more efficiently,” he said.
Emergence Quantum co-founder and CEO Professor David Reilly said cryogenic computing has long been known to offer speed and efficiency benefits, but that cooling complexity and cost have limited adoption. He argued that the scale of modern data centres and the size of today’s transistors could change that. “The cryo-computing epoch has arrived,” Reilly said.
Emergence Quantum Head of Cryogenics Dr Arman Siahvashi said Australia has “deep expertise in industrial scale cryogenics” tied to natural gas and hydrogen technologies, and suggested that capability could be applied to next-generation data centre infrastructure.
Professor Thomas Ohki, Emergence Quantum’s co-founder and CTO, said cryogenic cooling is required for several approaches to advanced computing, including superconducting logic and quantum systems. “All flavours of qubits need cryogenics one way or another,” he said.
The University of Sydney Vice-Chancellor and President Professor Mark Scott said the partnership reflected local strengths spanning cryogenics, quantum technologies and hyperscale data centres, and described it as an example of research being translated into commercial technology.
