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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Science
Robin McKie

DARK SECRETS: It s the perfect place london underground hosts tests for quantum compass that could replace gps | Vintage Vibes

Dr Joseph Cotter with the UK's first commercial quantum accelerometer for navigation.
Dr Joseph Cotter with his underground luggage, the UK's first commercial quantum accelerometer for navigation. Photograph: Thomas Angus

Dr Joseph Cotter takes some unusual pieces of luggage on his trips on the London underground. They include a stainless steel vacuum chamber, a few billion atoms of rubidium and an array of lasers that are used to cool his equipment to a temperature just above absolute zero.

While not the average kit you would expect to find being dragged into carriages on the District Line, this is the gear that Cotter – who works at Imperial College London’s Centre for Cold Matter – uses on his underground travels.

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