RADIO ASTRONOMY IS A FIELD DIRECTLY DRIVEN BY ADVANCEMENTS IN SPACE TECHNOLOGY INSTRUMENTATION. NEW DISCOVERIES WILL REQUIRE COMPACT EFFICIENTLY INTEGRATED RADIO/MICROWAVE FREQUENCY RECEIVERS WITH HIGH SENSITIVITY LOW POWER AND HIGH BANDWIDTH. I PROPOSE TO DEVELOP AN OPTICAL FIBER-BASED RARE-EARTH ION MICROWAVE TO OPTICAL PHOTON TRANSDUCER THAT COULD BE UTILIZED AS THE FRONT END OF A HIGH SENSITIVITY BROADBAND RF RECEIVER WHEN COUPLED TO THE OPTICAL FIBER-BASED SUPERCONDUCTING NANOWIRE SINGLE PHOTON DETECTORS (SNSPDS) DEVELOPED AT NASA S JPL. AN OPTICAL-MICROWAVE TRANSDUCER IS A DEVICE THAT ALLOWS FOR THE COHERENT CONVERSION OF ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION BETWEEN OPTICAL AND MICROWAVE FREQUENCIES. OUR NOVEL DEVICE DESIGN COMBINES NUMEROUS INDIVIDUAL QUANTUM AND CLASSICAL SUBSYSTEMS TO CREATE AN INTEGRATED ON-CHIP ARCHITECTURE. THE FIRST VITAL COMPONENT IS PLACING THE RARE-EARTH IONS INSIDE A MICROWAVE AND AN OPTICAL CAVITY WHICH ALLOWS FOR STRONG COUPLING OF THE OPTICAL AND MICROWAVE FREQUENCY TRANSITIONS OF THE ENSEMBLE OF IONS TO THE CAVITIES. THE SECOND VITAL COMPONENT IS THE OPTICAL FIBER NATURE OF THE TRANSDUCER WHICH ALLOWS FOR A SEAMLESS INTERCONNECT WITH WELL-ESTABLISHED OPTICAL FIBER TECHNOLOGIES AND COMPACT INTEGRATION WITH JPL S FIBER-BASED SNSPDS. THE DEVICE CAN BE FABRICATED WITH KNOWN MATERIALS AND DESIGN TECHNIQUES AND WILL BE CHARACTERIZED AND TESTED VIA ESTABLISHED MICROWAVE AND LASER SPECTROSCOPY TECHNIQUES. PROOF OF PRINCIPLE CALCULATIONS WERE PERFORMED TO SHOW THAT THE DEVICE CAN OPERATE IN THE UNIT QUANTUM EFFICIENCY REGIME. THE VISITING TECHNOLOGY EXPERIENCE (VTE) OF THE NSTRF WILL ALLOW ME TO CAPITALIZE ON THE JPL MICRODEVICE LABORATORIES EXPERTISE IN SUPERCONDUCTING CIRCUITS AND SELF-ALIGNING OPTICAL FIBER-TO DETECTOR COUPLING THAT ARE CRUCIAL TO OUR DEVICE. IN ADDITION THE VTE WILL ALLOW ME TO ACT AS AN AMBASSADOR BETWEEN THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO ARGONNE NATIONAL LABORATORY AND JPL IN ORDER TO COORDINATE RESEARCH PROJECTS AND INITIALIZE LONG TERM COLLABORATIONS AT THE FOREFRONT OF SINGLE PHOTON DETECTOR TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH AND ITS APPLICATION TO RADIO ASTRONOMY AND QUANTUM COMMUNICATION. SUCCESSFUL REALIZATION OF THIS QUANTUM TRANSDUCER CAN BE SEAMLESSLY INTEGRATED WITH JPL TECHNOLOGIES FOR EXTREMELY WEAK MICROWAVE RADIATION DETECTION AND POSSIBLE FURTHER APPLICATIONS IN RF COMMUNICATIONS RADAR REMOTE SENSING AND QUANTUM COMMUNICATION AND COMPUTING.