A lot of the fundamentals have actually already been researched and at least in academia, the various ideas have all been out there for quite a few decades now.
The main impetus has been in getting the funding to kickstart everything, and backing from Alphabet with strong financial support plus an intellectual talent from subsidiaries (Google, X, etc.) to pool from is the killer combination here in my opinion.
And in case anyone is wondering, yes, it's the same Bob Laughlin that won the 1998 Nobel prize in physics for the theory behind the fractional quantum Hall effect.
The main impetus has been in getting the funding to kickstart everything, and backing from Alphabet with strong financial support plus an intellectual talent from subsidiaries (Google, X, etc.) to pool from is the killer combination here in my opinion.