Q&As

Dr. Ilana Wisby is a deep tech entrepreneur and advisor, known for her pioneering leadership in quantum computing and emotionally intelligent organisations. As founding CEO of Oxford Quantum Circuits (OQC), she helped shape Europe’s quantum landscape, championed love-based leadership, and is now building a new venture in stealth.

Marilù Chiofalo obtained her PhD at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Pisa, and she is a condensed matter professor at the University of Pisa. Her research is in quantum technologies with interdisciplinary applications and in physics education and outreach research; she is part of the Labodif school and research institution for gender difference.

Gloria Platero is a physicist working on Condensed Matter Theory. She is Research Professor at the Spanish Research Council (CSIC) and works in the field of semiconductor quantum dots and their application in quantum technologies. She investigates quantum information transfer in different platforms. She also works on the topic of light-matter interaction and how Floquet engineering allows designing new properties in quantum materials. She is chair of the Semiconductor Commission of the International Association for Pure and Applied Physics (IUPAP), and vice president of the same association.

Sophia Economou is a Professor of Physics and the T. Marshall Hahn Chair in Physics at Virginia Tech. She is the founding director of the Virginia Tech Center for Quantum Information Science and Engineering. Her research focuses on theoretical aspects of quantum information science, including quantum computing, quantum communications, and quantum simulation algorithms.

Urbasi Sinha is a Professor of Light and Matter Physics at the Raman Research Institute, India. Her research is in the field of quantum technologies, where she uses experimental methods to investigate quantum information processing, precision tests of quantum mechanics, photonic quantum computing as well as quantum communications including quantum key distribution (QKD) in free space, fibre and integrated photonics.

Tanusri Saha-Dasgupta is a Professor and Director at S.N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, India. Her research focuses on computational condensed matter physics and the study of the optical, electronic, and magnetic properties of materials from first principles. Tanusri has been widely engaged in working groups, meetings, and other activities to promote gender parity in Indian academic institutions.

Sharona Gordon is a biophysicist, who applies the tools of physics to understand the fundamental principles of life. Her work combines biochemistry, electrophysiology, and fluorescence spectroscopy to understand how chemical signals get converted to electrical signals at cell membranes. She is a full professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine.

Flavia de Almeida Dias is an experimental particle physicist who has been a member of the ATLAS Collaboration at the Large Hadron Collider since 2013 and has had leading contributions in analyses involving pairs of vector bosons, searches for extra Higgs bosons and dark-matter mediators. She is an assistant professor at the University of Amsterdam and at Nikhef—the Dutch National Institute for Subatomic Physics. She was previously a postdoctoral research fellow at the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen and the University of Edinburgh.

Lyndsay Fletcher is a Professor of Astrophysics, specialising in solar physics, in the School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Glasgow and the Rosseland Centre for Solar Physics, University of Oslo.

Helen Gleeson is an experimental physicist working in soft matter. She has held leadership positions in both the University of Manchester and the University of Leeds where she is currently the Cavendish Professor of Physics. The focus of her research is in the physics of liquid crystals, both from a fundamental and applied perspective.