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Quantum science and technology
Quantum science and technology: the national mission and its hubs, quantum computers and qubits, quantum communication and cryptography, and quantum sensing. Prelims has asked about qubits and about the targets and hubs of the National Quantum Mission.
UPSC has asked
- Prelims 2025: the Majorana 1 chip and quantum computing
- Prelims 2022: the context in which the term qubit is used
12 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains
National Quantum Mission
The National Quantum Mission is the money and the structure behind much of what India now does in quantum technology. It was approved in 2023, is run by the Department of Science and Technology, and works through four thematic hubs, each led by an institute.
Quantum computing
- Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru
- With the Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC)
Quantum communication
- Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras
- With the Centre for Development of Telematics (C-DOT)
Quantum sensing and metrology
- IIT Bombay
Quantum materials and devices
- IIT Delhi
- It aims at intermediate scale quantum computers of 50 to 1,000 physical qubits over eight years.
- A progress report in August 2026 said 17 quantum startups are being supported and another 23 quantum teaching labs are being set up.
- The All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) has added undergraduate minor and Master of Technology (M.Tech) programmes.
- The Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) has transferred a Quantum Random Number Generator and a quantum processor controller to industry.
- The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology runs Qniverse, a quantum computing platform.
UPSC has asked
- Prelims 2026: the mission's qubit target and its four thematic hubs
PIB, 12 Aug 2026: National Quantum Mission: hubs and progress (opens in a new tab)
7 Sep 2026 · Prelims and Mains
Entanglement sudden death
Quantum entanglement weakens through decoherence as the particles decay towards their ground state. Entanglement sudden death is its complete loss at a finite time, before that decay has finished.
- The Raman Research Institute, Bengaluru, showed with mission funding that one well timed flip can prevent, delay or hasten entanglement sudden death.
- Photons carried the states, vertical polarisation standing for the excited state and horizontal for the ground state.
- The flip swaps the populations of the two states partway through, so timing itself becomes a control resource that needs no new hardware.
31 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains
C-DOT quantum security products
A quantum computer able to break today's encryption does not exist yet, but traffic recorded today can be kept and read once one does. India's answer has a physical half and a mathematical half, and C-DOT builds both.
- C-DOT unveiled 14 indigenous quantum security products.
- They include fibre based Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) systems, a measurement device independent QKD system and an indigenous single photon detector.
- Its quantum safe encryptors work at up to 200 Gbps on Post-Quantum Cryptography algorithms standardised by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).
PIB, 31 Aug 2026: C-DOT launches 14 indigenous quantum-security products (opens in a new tab)