Carlo Maria Scandolo

Dr. Carlo Maria Scandolo

DPhil

Contact information

Phone number

Office: 403-220-3939

Location

Office: MS320

Background

Educational Background

DPhil Quantum foundations and information theory, University of Oxford, 2018

MSc (Hons) Physics, Galilean School of Higher Education - University of Padua, 2015

MSc Theoretical Physics, University of Padua, 2014

BSc Physics, University of Padua, 2012

Biography

Carlo Maria Scandolo graduated from the University of Padua, Italy, with a BSc in physics in 2012, and an MSc in theoretical physics in 2014. His master's thesis was on entanglement in general probabilistic theories, under Giulio Chiribella's external supervision. While at the University of Padua, Carlo Maria was also part of the Galilean School of Higher Education, a school of excellence, admitting each year 14 top students from freshers are the Faculty of Science, and providing enhanced university education. After graduating from the University of Padua, Carlo Maria spent a year at Tsinghua University, Beijing, continuing work and research with Giulio Chiribella. In 2015, he was admitted to a DPhil (Oxford PhD) at the University of Oxford, working on quantum information and foundations under Jonathan Barrett's supervision. He graduated in 2018, with a doctoral thesis on the informational foundations of thermodynamics in general probabilistic theories. Carlo Maria joined the University of Calgary in 2018 as a postdoctoral associate, working with Gilad Gour and Barry Sanders on resource theories for quantum information and beyond, with applications even to genetic regulation. From September 2020 to June 2023, Carlo Maria was assistant professor, and since July 2023 he has been associate professor at the Department of Mathematics & Statistics and at the Institute for Quantum Science and Technology.

Research

Areas of Research

Quantum information theory, Quantum resource theories, Quantum foundations

Courses

Course number Course title Semester
MATH 211 Linear Methods I Fall 2024
MATH 211 Linear Methods I Winter 2024
MATH 307 Complex Analysis I Winter 2024

Projects

The power of quantum resources

The development of quantum information theory has seen a major blossoming both of scientific results and technological advances that are becoming commercially available (random number generators, cryptography, etc.).

The key of the success of quantum information lies in the fact that quantum objects are actual resources, for they provide concrete advantage over ordinary (i.e. classical) objects. In other words, the quantum world has a power we can harness.

My research aims at exploring the power and limitations of quantum resources, such as quantum entanglement, in order to devise better protocols and novel quantum technologies that take full advantage of the quantum world.

Crucial ingredients of all quantum technologies are quantum channels, which are ways to transmit quantum information in space (e.g. to a satellite) and through time (e.g. time evolution of a physical system). In order to devise powerful quantum technologies, one must use quantum channels in the most effective way, so that quantum resources are not wasted or destroyed in the process. A proposed large-scale implementation of quantum computing is in a distributed fashion, with quantum channels connecting various nodes of a network, and employing quantum entanglement as an essential resource to carry out computation. In this setting, it is vital to quantify, e.g., the largest amount of entanglement that can be extracted out of a quantum channel, which can then be used to implement the actual distributed computation. My research provides quantitative answers to this and similar issues that are so central for the development of quantum technologies.

My research explores more theoretical problems too, such as generalized scenarios for quantum thermodynamics that formalize an extended version of the second law of thermodynamics. Another theoretical direction concerns the emergence of the classical limit out of generic physical theories that may even be beyond quantum, such as the theories that have been proposed for quantum gravity.

Awards

  • Trusted Reviewer, IoP. 2022

Publications