The “graphene rush” has triggered a great interest in the design and fabrication of synthetic 2D materials (S2DMs) excelling in their chemical and physical properties for future emerging technologies addressing numerous societal needs, such as faster and better performing electronics, as well as energy storage and conversion. To match the societal benefits of being at the forefront of new technological and scientific developments, the EC requires a highly skilled scientific and technical workforce that can efficiently finalize the shift to a true knowledge-based society. ULTIMATE will provide to 15 talented young researchers a well-structured training in the burgeoning field of S2DMs by developing their knowledge and understanding on: i) how to generate novel atomically precise 2D materials with defined structure and composition, and ii) how to best exploit their unique and tunable properties for electronics and energy applications. This training-through-research requires an intersectoral approach by specialized and skilled scientists from different (sub-)disciplines including molecular modeling (TUD), organic, macro-/supramolecular synthesis (TUD, HUB, UAM), production of S2DMs (GRA, TUD, UNISTRA, IIT), hierarchical self-assembly (UNISTRA, KUL, HUB, CNR), surface and interface studies (KUL, EMPA, IBM, KFUG, CNR, APE, IIT, UNISTRA), photochemistry and photophysics (UNIME, HUB, UNISTRA, IIT), device fabrication and characterization (IIT, TUD, UNISTRA), and other skills, as well as a strong commitment to the training of young talents with the ultimate goal of achieving scientific breakthroughs in this very topical area of science and technology. The ULTIMATE network will strengthen the EC training efforts by delivering 540 person-months of unprecedented cross-disciplinary and supra-sectoral training that is carefully structured in local, network-wide, and beyond-network training activities, as well as complementary and transferable skills.

The goal of the project is to develop the technology foundation for an advanced optical microscope imaging at a resolution beyond the Rayleigh limit, which is set by the photon wavelength. The proposed microscope technique is based on super-twinning photon states (N-partite entangled states) with the de Broglie wavelength equal to a fraction of the photon wavelength. Such microscopy technique will comprise building blocks for object illumination, capturing of scattered twinning photons and data processing. Based on advanced group-III nitride and III-V alloy epitaxial growths and wafer processing techniques we will build the first solid-state emitter of highly entangled photon states, utilizing the cooperative effect of Dicke superradiance (super-fluorescence) emission. Single-photon avalanche detector arrays with data pre-processing capabilities sufficient for capturing high-order field correlation functions of scattered twinning photons will be developed. A dedicated data processing algorithm for extracting the image of an illuminated object from the statistics of scattered twinning photons will complement the hardware. The project goal is to demonstrate imaging at 42 nm spatial resolution using 5-partite entangled photons at 420 nm wavelength. This quantum imaging technology will open the way for compact, portable, super-resolution microscope techniques, with no moving parts and no requirements to the optical properties of the sample.