Advancements in Time
Our relationship to time has always advanced in lockstep with technology.
Our ancestors cared about seasons, so created calendars tied to the movement of celestial bodies.
The first crude timepieces were created to regulate commerce.
Navigation on the open oceans led to better portable clocks.
Transportation - and the need to keep trains on time - led to watches.
The digital age has now forced us to track and parse time to billionths of a second.
Our networks and electronics don't care about absolute time; instead, they need a common time standard for signal processing, data buffers, and time-stamping of digital events.
Feeding this critical need is an extensive timing infrastructure consisting of clocks connected with synchronization links. And at the head end of this timing network is a global timing reference, UTC, which is carefully maintained by labs around the world and distributed via a RF signal from global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) like GPS.
But the need for more accurate timing has become even more critical for efficient distributed databases and cell networks; unlocking better spectrum efficiency; preventing power surges in data centers; and synchronizing cell towers to enable last-mile PNT over 5G for autonomous vehicles and industrial robotics.
And, while clocks have improved immensely in the past half century, GNSS timing accuracy plateaued a while ago.
The next generation technology can only advance with better synchronization.

Last Newsletter Theme: Ride the Light

• Six active projects are helping us develop the quantum+optical terminals and ground stations that will form a future global timing service:
  • Gave a Poster Presentation for the ESA NAVISP Industry Day highlighting our work on Project Apollo, while also preparing for a Phase I Final Report in March.
  • Preparing for a Detailed Design Review in mid-March on Project Aristocles.
  • Working with partners to deliver an optical terminal engineering model and modems for free-space optical communications field testing for the SDA project.
  • Preparing for a CDR in April for our US Space Force customer.
  • Working on a follow-on to the TNO-led KiQQer project.
  • In the design stage for the Kickoff Meeting for a new project for a free-space quantum time transfer field demonstration in September working with leading quantum hardware and quantum security partners. We call this Project Cyclops.
• Also wrapping up a pair of internal R&D projects:
  • A project with University of Colorado Quantum Forge students to develop a Bell State test.
  • A portable free-space Quantum Time Transfer demonstration kit so that we can take our entangled photons on the road for customer and conference demonstrations. Planning for a big unveiling in April so stay tuned!
• Busy stretch of conferences and presentations, including:
  • Joined an interesting panel discussion on the "Space 2.0 - The Impact of AI, Cyber, and Data on Space Operations" at the Miami Space Summit.
  • Presented “Optical Ground Stations & Quantum Advancements in Timing and Encryption in Contested and Congested Environments" at the Ground Station Architecture Workshop (GSAW) 2025 in LA.
  • Attended the AFA Warfare Symposium in Colorado.
  • Presented a poster for the NAVISP Industry Days 2025 in London highlighting our work on a detailed simulation model for ESA [pictured here with our partners at KISPE]

• Preparing for meetings next week at Satellite 2025 in Washington DC.

• Some people believe that quantum computing will be bigger than AI, which explains why quantum investment is accelerating and two bills are circulating in the US Congress: the $2.7B National Quantum Initiative Reauthorization Act to Secure Quantum Leadership and the $2.5B DOE Quantum Leadership Act.
• There are also a lot of interest in quantum networks, which has spurred the development of 44 quantum testbeds around the world and advancements like a recent  quantum teleportation demonstration over 30 km of fiber in a real-world environment. 
• The latest Space Threat Fact Sheet notes that, in 2015, China "officially designated space as a new domain of warfare" and, since then, their space presence increased six-fold with "more than 1015 satellites," three reusable spaceplanes, a direct-ascent antisatellite (DA-ASAT) missile test, satellite “inspection and repair” systems, laser weapons, and jammers.
• Which means space is getting crowded. Another 218 satellites were launched in January brings the total to over 30,000 objects in space, which is forcing LEO satellite operators into thousands of collision avoidance maneuvers every month. The majority of active satellites belong to Starlink, but China's SpaceSail, Europe's IRIS2, and other commercial satellite operators are looking to close the gap. 
• Polish researchers believe they have tracked GPS jamming in the Baltics to ships, which would "explain the shifting pattern of GPS disruption in the region."
• AI has lots of uses including being used to overcome - and improve - jamming. 
• We previously talked about all the amazing applications for entangled photons, so add the  measurement of the Earth’s rotation to the list.

• Satellite 2025, March 10 - 13, Washington DC
• Space-Comm Expo, March 11 -12, London, UK
• Space Symposium, April 7 - 10, Colorado Springs, Colorado - Stay Tuned!
• Nemertes [NEXT], April 7 - 10, Nashville, TN - presenting!
• Workshop on Synchronization and Timing Systems (WSTS), May 12 - 15, 2025, Savannah, GA
• European Navigation Conference, May 21 - 23, 2025, Wroclaw, Poland
• Joint Navigation Conference (JNC) 2025, June 2 - 5, Cincinnati, Ohio
• Quantum World Congress, September 16 - 18, Tysons, Virginia
• World Space Business Week, September 15 - 19, Paris, France
• International Timing and Sync Forum (ITSF), October 27 - 30, Prague, Czech Republic
• UK National Quantum Technologies Showcase, November 7, London, UK
• UK PNT Leadership Seminar, November, London, UK

You have heard the old expression "time is money."
But time is more like art - you know what it is, but you can't explain it.
For most of human existence we thought we knew what time is: a constant linear progression from past to present, experienced by every being in the universe at the same rate.
Then along comes Einstein. His theory of special relativity claims that time - and space - are not absolutes.
The speed of light in a vacuum is the absolute. Which mean time changes depending on how fast you are moving. It just turned out that all of us trapped on Earth are at roughly the same relativistic speed, so time feels constant.
But at least we know that time exists, and that only moves in one direction - forwards. Right?
Physicists have suspected that time can move in both directions, or may be an illusion.
A recent experiment suggests that, at the quantum level, time flows in both directions. Only us large folks, stuck in a world of ever-increasing entropy, experience time going forward.