Q.ANT¶
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The systems are not yet available to general users.
The Q.ANT Native Processing Server (NPS) is a photonic computing platform developed by Q.ANT, a Stuttgart-based company and subsidiary of TRUMPF. Unlike conventional processors, which use electrical signals to process information, photonic processors use light signals. This enables them to perform certain compute operations with significantly higher energy efficiency — a promising approach for AI workloads and other data-intensive tasks.
The system at KIT was procured as part of the quantum computing project QuSol and is funded by the Federal Ministry for Research, Technology and Space with approximately €4.3 million. It complements the classical HPC infrastructure at KIT as an accelerator for hybrid compute strategies, where each sub-task is executed on the most suitable hardware.
KIT researchers are investigating which application types benefit most from light-based processors and how they can be integrated into existing HPC workflows. A particular focus is on hybrid solution strategies — splitting complex computations across CPU, GPU, quantum, and photonic hardware to achieve faster results with lower energy consumption. Results are made available as open source.
For more background, see the KIT press release (German).
Hardware Overview¶
Q.ANT NPS nodes will be installed in October 2026 as x86-compatible servers and accessible via the x86 login node.
Two variants will be available in October 2026:
| Node type | Description |
|---|---|
| NPS 2 | Q.ANT Native Processing Server 2 |
| NPS 2+ | Q.ANT Native Processing Server 2+ (enhanced variant) |
Access¶
Access to the Q.ANT NPS nodes is restricted. Users must be added manually to the Q.ANT access group. To request access, open a support ticket and briefly describe your intended use case.
Using Q.ANT NPS¶
To use the Q.ANT NPS nodes, request them via Slurm. Two partitions are available:
qant-nps1— NPS 2 nodesqant-nps2— NPS 2+ nodes
Use sbatch or salloc to access the partitions: