IBM Research Ireland moves to the heart of Dublin with a new lab at Trinity College Dublin

If you’ve ever been lucky enough to walk through the campus of Trinity College Dublin, it’s easy to feel the centuries of history around you.

Founded in 1592, generations of students and faculty that have passed through the heart of Dublin, and their accomplishments have come about through years of collaboration between students, their teachers, and the broader scientific community. For example, if you work in quantum computing, you’re very likely to deal with the mathematical function Hamiltonians. They were created by the TCD alum Sir William Rowan Hamilton. And what we know of quantum computing wouldn't be possible today if it weren’t for Nobel laureate and TCD graduate Ernest Thomas Sinton Walton’s work on splitting the atom.

That passion to find new breakthroughs continues to fuel Trinity students today, and it’s a similar drive that researchers across IBM share. It’s why now, after decades of successful partnerships, IBM Research has moved into a new lab on Trinity’s campus. The IBM Research team moved en masse from the outskirts of the city into the new space within Trinity’s business school, which is co-located with Trinity’s Research and Innovation teams. The lab will be focused on many of the research initiatives that concern IBM Research at large, including AI, accelerated discovery, IT security, AI hardware, and quantum computing, as IBM Research’s only lab within the European Union.

“Trinity has a long history of successful collaboration with IBM. Through this partnership, we have made advances in critical areas that further our collective goal of using research and innovation to address the grand challenges facing society,” said Trinity Provost Dr. Linda Doyle. “Our partnership now involves co-location for engagement, research and innovation activities which nurtures conditions for research and innovation to thrive even further.”

The team is building on that long history with each new day. Their last all-hands meeting, for example, are now taking place in the same physics lecture hall where Hamilton and Walton taught and Erwin Schrödinger lectured.

IBM has been working with Trinity College for more than 25 years. Since 2021, the two groups have partnered on a predoctoral fellowship program that gives promising students the opportunity to work at IBM Research solving real-world problems as they work towards their doctorate.

That partnership blossomed into an even deeper collaboration, with IBM and Trinity working together to boost adoption of quantum computing in Ireland and accelerate discoveries in science. This led to a breakthrough in 2023, where quantum physicists from Trinity and IBM Research successfully simulated super diffusion, in a system of interacting quantum particles, on a quantum computer.

“Trinity Innovation and Enterprise are proud to announce this landmark partnership with IBM, which marks a significant milestone for research and innovation at Trinity College Dublin,” said Dr. Michelle Olmstead, chief innovation and enterprise officer at Trinity. “Together, we are creating pathways for groundbreaking research, innovation, and new learning opportunities. We look forward to shaping the future on quantum computing, climate research and AI analysis with this exciting partnership.”

Building on similar initiatives IBM Research has run at MIT and ETH Zurich, they’ve also been conducting “masterclasses” on TCD’s campus, bringing in prominent researchers as guest speakers like IBM’s own Sergey Bravyi and Kush Varshney, giving students access to the absolute cutting edge of new ideas in the fields of AI and quantum computing. The team in Dublin plans to do even more of these classes now that getting to campus will be as easy as getting to the office.

“The more we collaborated with Trinity College Dublin, the clearer it became: co-locating was the natural next step. While academia-industry partnerships come in many forms, this one stands out. By bringing together some of the brightest minds from both sides, we're already seeing remarkable outcomes,” said Juan Bernabé-Moreno, director of IBM Research Europe responsible for Ireland and UK. “Whether through structured research sessions or chance conversations over coffee, this close proximity is sparking fresh ideas and driving impactful innovation.”

It’s a big change for IBM Research from the previous facility, which was at an IBM facility outside of the city of Dublin, sharing space with IBM Software colleagues. The new lab, situated on the first floor of Trinity Business School, houses researchers representing just about every pillar of study that IBM Research. That includes teams working on human-centered AI, quantum computing, AIU hardware, security, and many more.

“This partnership brings two institutions together with a long history of research excellence and creates a powerhouse of innovation in Ireland and Europe,” said Alessandro Curioni, IBM Fellow and VP of IBM Research Europe and Africa. “From the research perspective, we are keen on partnering with Trinity College to advance the discovery of new ways of representing nature and new algorithms to leverage the convergence of AI and quantum computing.”

What’s next

A little under a year ago, Trinity and IBM Research decided to deepen their partnership, and have been working on several initiatives to spur technological development in Ireland and across the EU.

The two worked with IDA Ireland, a state-sponsored initiative to spur growth in the country, to hire roughly 35 pre-PhD researchers to work at IBM’s lab in Ireland to train across domains in AI, quantum computing, IT security and accelerated discovery. TCD and IBM Research also agreed to pursue industrial partnerships in Ireland and across the EU, as well as expanding their upskilling outreach activities to help the local workforce prepare for the future where AI, quantum computing, and other advanced technologies enter the mainstream.

The two groups will work together to forge or join new research initiatives and have already seen success in several projects. They’re forming a joint research agenda around climate technologies, quantum computing, and AI. Some of the projects they’ve worked on already include 6G-XCEL (or 6G TransContinental Edge Learning), which brings together industry and academia from across the EU and the US to explore AI deployment in systems and networks for next-generation 6G mobile communication technology. The group was coordinated by TCD, with major participation by IBM.

The two are also working on models and analysis tool to support the European Commission’s European Digital Twin Ocean (EDITO) project. These will be applied to some key use cases for the marine coastal ecosystems located at some of major regions in the area, including the Celtic Sea and Waterford Estuary.

“The support this partnership offers for students and researchers is significant, in particular, providing brilliant opportunities for our stellar PhD researchers to work at the nexus of research and innovation, preparing them for tackling the great challenges facing society at large,” said Trinity’s Doyle. “I look forward to seeing what significant breakthroughs will be made in critical areas, such as quantum computing, climate science and artificial intelligence, by continuing to build on our history of successful engagement and this transformative partnership.”

The partnerships are also expanding both groups’ reach into the wider global scientific community, as well. Ireland plans to become a full member of CERN this year, which TCD will lead the country’s engagement. IBM Research has a close relationship with CERN, in both AI technology and quantum computing. Trinity has also joined the AI Alliance, cofounded by IBM and Meta in 2023, with the goal of promoting equitable AI innovation across Ireland.