Professor Alexander Lvovsky,
Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Calgary
Group Lead, Quantum Optics Group, Russian Quantum Center
Blue Building 303 (Multifunctional Zone), Skoltech Campus
29 May at 15:00
ABSTRACT:
Superpositions of macroscopically distinct quantum states, introduced in Schrödinger’s famous Gedankenexperiment, are an epitome of quantum “strangeness” and a natural tool for determining the validity limits of quantum physics. The optical incarnation of Schrödinger’s cat – the superposition of two opposite-amplitude coherent states – is also the backbone of quantum information processing in the continuous-variable domain. The talk will cover recent experimental progress on preparing such states, applying them in quantum technology and communications, and increasing their amplitudes.
Short BIO:
Alexander Lvovsky is an experimental physicist. He was born and raised in Moscow and did his undergraduate in Physics at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology. In 1993, he became a graduate student in Physics at Columbia University in New York City. His thesis research, conducted under the supervision of Dr. Sven R. Hartmann, was in the field of coherent optical transients in atomic gases. After completing his Ph. D. in 1998, he spent a year at the University of California, Berkeley as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Physics, and then five years at Universität Konstanz in Germany, first as an Alexander von Humboldt postdoctoral fellow, then as a research group leader in quantum-optical information technology. In 2004 he became Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Calgary, where he remains today, working at the same time as a part-time research group leader at the Russian Quantum Center. Alexander is a past Canada Research Chair, a lifetime member of the American Physical Society, a Fellow of the Optical Society of America and a winner of many awards – most notably the International Quantum Communications award, commendation letter from the Prime Minister of Canada and the Emmy Noether research award of the German Science Foundation. His research has been featured by CBC, NBC, Wired, New Scientist, MIT Technology Review, TASS, Daily Mail, and other media. Alexander conducts wide-profile experimental and theoretical research in the fields of quantum optics, quantum information, and quantum machine learning.
For more information about Prof Lvovsky’s work, see e.g. his RQC research page and his page on Google scholar.