Activities on Quantum Computation in Italy and the Superconducting Quantum Computer@UNINA (Quantum Computing)

• Francesco Tafuri (Universita di Napoli Federico II)

Room: Seminar Hall Italy has designed a national strategy on quantum technologies including quantum computation within the more general European framework. Superconducting circuits have been up to now the most successful platform worldwide to build a quantum computer, being developed and used by major international companies since early stages. University of Napoli (UNINA) has a long-standing experience on superconducting electronics and on its key device i.e. the Josephson junction, and in 2024 has assembled the first quantum computer in Italy “Partenope” based on a 25-qubits processor produced by Quantware recently expanded with a 64-qubits QPU. Partenope has been the platform where to create a solid expertise for the characterization, calibration, benchmarking and implementation of subregisters of QPUs and to focus on all hardware aspects including control and read out. A full control of Partenope also due to a comprehensive handling of the physics behind including its noise issues, such as decoherence, error in the gate implementation, readout error, has allowed the run of various algorithms, paving the way more and more towards an open-source quantum computing platform. A profound understating of all the physics of the hardware, including material science issues, has promoted progress in developing independent pathways with innovative solutions for novel quantum components. These range from a new type of qubit based on ferromagnetic Josephson junctions and a novel tunable qubits coupler to qubit readout based on Josephson digital phase detectors and to novel schemes of microwave demultiplexer.

Metrology for Quantum Technologies (Quantum Sensing and Metrology)

• Venu Gopal Achanta (NPL, Delhi)

Room: Seminar Hall There is an enhanced global activity since 2019 to implement the redefined SI units in terms of the fundamental constants. While this area is known as Quantum Metrology, another area has gained prominence as quantum technologies mature across various domains. In areas such as communications, computing, and sensing, there is a need for calibration, testing, and certification facilities to support emerging industries. Single photon metrology is one such area that encompasses non-classical light sources, single-photon detectors, quantum random numbers, among others. Another important area is quantum sensors, such as magnetometers, electrometers, and gyroscopes. In this talk, after introducing quantum metrology, I will present recent work at CSIR-NPL in these areas.

Quantum at the Speed of Light: Exotic Photonic States, Certified Randomness, and Quantum-Secure Technologies (Quantum Communication)

• Urbasi Sinha (Raman Research Institute, Bengaluru)

Room: Seminar Hall Quantum mechanics is at its most striking when it produces states that have no classical counterpart, superpositions that refuse to behave like “either/or,” correlations that outlive distance, and measurement outcomes that cannot be explained by any classical hidden-variable story. Photons are the ideal stage for this drama: they propagate at the speed of light, preserve coherence over long distances, and can be sculpted into high-dimensional and multi-photon quantum states that are both experimentally accessible and technologically actionable. In this talk, I will trace a “discovery-to-deployment” arc for photonic quantum technologies, grounded in our experience across fundamental experiments and translational engineering. Starting from core quantum resources in light, such as superposition, interference, and entanglement, I will discuss how foundational tests of nonclassicality and measurement can be repurposed into practical capabilities within quantum communications: trustworthy entropy generation, certified key material, and protocols whose security rests on experimentally verifiable quantum behaviour rather than assumptions about computational hardness. I will highlight the role of certified quantum randomness as a central primitive for quantum communications. Nonclassical correlations enable certification of unpredictability, including device-independent approaches based on Bell nonlocality and single-system certification using temporal inequalities (Leggett–Garg). These tools illustrate a broader theme: “exotic” quantum behaviour can be engineered into an operational guarantee, and then used directly in communication and cryptographic stacks. Building on this, I will discuss progress in quantum-secure communication, including quantum key distribution and its evolution from controlled laboratory demonstrations to field-relevant implementations. I will touch on atmospheric free-space links, pointing-acquisition-tracking for moving platforms, and the pathway toward satellite-based quantum communication. Finally, I will look ahead to scalable quantum networks, where multi-node entanglement distribution, quantum repeaters, and photon–matter interfaces (quantum memories) become essential. The talk will close with lessons from translating photonic quantum prototypes into products, including reliability engineering, validation standards, and the practical constraints that determine whether an exotic quantum state remains a beautiful experiment or becomes a working technology.

Quantum Simulations: from Condensed Matter to Particle Physics Models (Condensed Matter Physics)

• Elisa Ercolessi (University of Bologna)

Room: Seminar Hall Building on Richard Feynman’s seminal insight that quantum systems can efficiently simulate other quantum systems, this talk reviews recent advances in the quantum simulation of fundamental models across condensed matter and particle physics. After introducing the core concepts and motivations of quantum simulation, I will discuss representative examples implemented on different experimental platforms, highlighting both their capabilities and current limitations.

Quantum Sensing and Imaging with NV Centers in Diamond (Quantum Sensing and Metrology)

• Kasturi Saha (IIT Bombay)

Room: Seminar Hall There is a global surge in research aimed at leveraging the unique features of quantum physics to advance technologies in metrology, computing, and communication—an initiative broadly known as the development of “engineered quantum systems.” Among the promising platforms are color centers in diamond, particularly nitrogen-vacancy (NV) centers, which offer a pathway to high-precision magnetometry and could enable nanoscale magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of individual complex molecules. In this talk, I will present our ongoing work toward building an imaging system capable of mapping magnetic fields with spatial resolution of 1 um. I will also discuss our progress on creating localized sensors for detecting biomolecular signals.

Quantum Communications for Space and Ground: Moving Forward with Basic Science and Pushing the Applications (Quantum Communication)

• Paolo Villoresi (University of Padova)

Room: Seminar Hall The most fundamental level of communications is realized with the exchange of quantum states, which is the essence of quantum communications. In this way, it is possible to connect different systems but also to analyse the changes introduced by communication channels. These possibilities are useful tools for the investigation of the basic principles of quantum mechanics. Quantum communication is also a useful tool for countering cyber attacks, through the secure exchange of cryptographic keys and the generation of genuine random numbers. The talk will present current aspects of ongoing research, in particular at the Res. Center for Quantum Technologies of the University of Padua and the QuantumFuture Research group.

Towards Practical Quantum Secure Communication Networks (Quantum Communication)

• Bhaskar Kanseri (IIT Delhi)

Room: Seminar Hall Contrary to classical networks, quantum networks use the principles of quantum physics to transmit and process information offering immense potential in several areas including secure communication, powerful computing, advanced sensing capabilities and many upcoming domains. Quantum entanglement, an essential trait of quantum physics, offers an extra layer of security in distributing keys and also simplifies their analysis. In addition, it is useful in computing, imaging and sensing applications. This talk will highlight the development of quantum network elements in our lab for both free-space and fibre based applications. These include entangled photon sources, both for free-space and fibre based communication and characterization of their quantum features. Efforts of our group so far in realizing quantum key distribution using hybrid schemes for lab scale and for long distance including real field environment would also be detailed. The need of multi-node quantum networks for realizing quantum internet would also be discussed focussing on applications related to security. Specifically, the practical aspects of entanglement enabled hybrid networks will be emphasized, focussing on the need of coexistence of classical and quantum signal on the same fibre, and use of photon number resolving detectors for enhanced security, which are primitives for realizing such practical intercity quantum communication networks.

Two-dimensional Materials: Moire and Beyond (Quantum Materials and Devices)

• Chandni U (IISc, Bengaluru)

Room: Seminar Hall Our current technological platforms are grounded in a thorough understanding of material band structures and their direct implications for electronic and optoelectronic properties. Modifying the band structure of naturally occurring materials is a complex endeavor, and commonly used experimental techniques such as strain, pressure, and crystal structure engineering often results in only minor adjustments to band gaps, effective masses, and other key material parameters. One of the recent platforms in this respect is the field of moire materials, where two dimensional (2D) materials twisted or hetero-stacked can lead to a variety of exotic properties including superconductivity and other exotic states such as Chern insulators, orbital ferromagnets, and nematic phases. In this talk, I shall highlight various facets of many body correlations that we have explored using a combination of transport techniques in moire graphene. I will also touch upon an alternative experiment to develop a new metamaterials platform using Bernal bilayer graphene, where external, modulated electrostatic gate potentials can be used as a tunable knob to engineer superlattices and flat electronic bands. The results highlight new routes to band engineering, potentially extendable to complex periodic structures that are untenable in natural materials.

Key Highlights and Future Projections of Gravitational-Wave Astronomy with LIGO-India (Gravitational Waves)

• Archana Pai (IIT Bombay)

Room: Seminar Hall Within a decade, since the landmark discovery in 2015, the gravitational wave astronomy has rapidly evolved, with approximately 390+ compact binary merger events having been observed, predominantly involving black holes. The talk will provide key highlights of the gravitational wave transients and future projections of gravitational wave astronomy in the era with the LIGO-India detector. It will highlight prospects of collaboration between Indian and Italian gravitational wave astronomers in the gravitational wave transient astronomy.

Machine Learning Approaches to Energy Landscape Exploration in Disordered Materials (AI/ML)

• Anoop Krishnan (IIT Delhi)

Room: Seminar Hall The energy landscape paradigm provides a powerful framework for understanding the structure, dynamics, and properties of disordered systems such as glasses, yet navigating these complex, high-dimensional landscapes remains computationally challenging. This talk presents three recent advances in leveraging machine learning and differentiable simulations to explore energy landscapes of disordered materials. First, we will discuss a graph reinforcement learning framework, namely, StriderNet, that learns policies to displace atoms toward low-energy configurations on rough, non-convex landscapes. Evaluated on binary Lennard-Jones particles, calcium silicate hydrates, and disordered silicon, StriderNet outperforms classical optimization algorithms with remarkable transferability to system sizes an order of magnitude beyond training conditions. Second, we demonstrate approaches for visualizing high-dimensional energy landscapes through dimensionality reduction and interpretable machine learning, revealing hidden patterns in configurational space and providing intuitive understanding of energy barriers, basins, and transition pathways. Finally, an end-to-end differentiable molecular dynamics framework exploits automatic differentiation to compute gradients of macroscopic properties, including elastic constants, vibrational density of states, and transport coefficients, with respect to force field parameters, enabling inverse design of force fields from target material properties. Together, these advances demonstrate how AI algorithms are transforming our ability to understand and engineer disordered materials through their energy landscapes.

Particle Physics in the Era of AI: Discovery at the LHC (Particle Physics)

• Maurizio Pierini (CERN)

Room: Seminar Hall The enormous data volumes produced by the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) have made artificial intelligence (AI) an essential component of modern particle physics. Deep Learning now plays a central role in triggering, reconstruction, simulation, and searches for new phenomena, enhancing sensitivity to rare signals amid overwhelming backgrounds. This talk will highlight how AI-driven methods are reshaping the LHC physics program.

Superconducting Quantum Electrical Circuits (Quantum Computing)

• Rajamani Vijayraghavan (TIFR Mumbai)

Room: Seminar Hall Starting in the mid-1980s with the quantum control and detection of individual atoms/ions, we now have access to a variety of controllable quantum systems. One particular platform which has emerged as a popular choice is superconducting electrical circuits operating at ultra-low temperatures. In this talk, I will introduce the concept of a quantum electrical circuit and how one can use superconducting materials to build them. The flexibility in circuit design allows one to create near ideal custom Hamiltonians which can be used to implement textbook measurements and explore various phenomena in previously unexplored regimes. The same flexibility also enables the possibility of large-scale chips for quantum computing applications. I will discuss some examples to illustrate the versatility of this platform and also highlight the various challenges in building a practical quantum computer. I will conclude by describing our research group’s efforts at TIFR in this area, and also summarize the plans under the National Quantum Mission of India.

Journey to the Center of the Earth with Deep-Learning Atomistic Simulations (Condensed Matter Physics)

• Sandro Scandolo

Room: Seminar Hall Buried more than 5,000 km beneath the surface, Earth’s inner core remains one of the planet’s most mysterious and inaccessible regions. Seismic data constrain its density and pressure and indicate that it is a solid composed primarily of iron. Yet its temperature, crystal structure, and the origin of the unusually slow seismic-wave propagation remain uncertain. Reproducing inner-core conditions in the laboratory is still extremely challenging. First-principles atomistic simulations based on density-functional theory have provided valuable insights, but their scope has traditionally been limited to small simulation cells. By combining these methods with deep-learning techniques, we extended simulations from a few hundred to more than one million atoms while preserving chemical accuracy in the interatomic interactions. Our simulations indicate that Earth’s inner core is best described as a cubic iron–silicon alloy. This Fe-based solid solution matches seismic observations better than any previously proposed structure and opens new perspectives on the nature of Earth’s deepest interior.

Gender in STEM

• Poonam Mehta (JNU)

Room: Seminar Hall

The Theory Formerly Known as Strings (Particle Physics)

• Sunil Mukhi (IISER Pune)

Room: Seminar Hall I will give a short survey of how the landscape of formal theoretical physics has evolved in recent decades. Today, "String Theory" has become a terminology for a wide-ranging set of techniques rooted in special and general relativity and quantum mechanics, with applications across High Energy Physics, Gravitation, Quantum Information and Condensed Matter Physics.

Gravitational-Wave Detectors: Breakthrough Science and Opportunities for Indo-Italian Collaborations (Gravitational Waves)

• Jan Harms (Gran Sasso Science Institute)

Room: Seminar Hall Observations with the gravitational-wave detectors Virgo and LIGO opened a new window to our Universe and have led to breakthrough discoveries revolutionizing our understanding of spacetime and matter under extreme conditions. Meanwhile, the science communities around the world are preparing for the construction of a new generation of detectors including LIGO India and the Einstein Telescope in Europe. The exquisite technological challenges require us to work together across countries and continents. In this talk, we highlight the importance and opportunities of cooperation in this new field especially in the context of a possible Indo-Italian collaboration.

Multi-Messenger Astronomy: Present Status and Future Perspectives of the Italy-India Collaboration (Astronomy and Astrophysics)

• Marica Branchesi (Gran Sasso Science Institute)

Room: Seminar Hall Multi-messenger astronomy has opened a new window on the Universe by combining gravitational waves with electromagnetic and particle observations. What began as the detection of rare and exceptional events is now evolving toward a routine exploration of the cosmos, enabled by increasingly sensitive observatories. In this talk, I will review the current status and future prospects of multi-messenger astronomy, highlighting the key role of global networks of gravitational-wave detectors and the coordinated operation of ground-based and space-borne observatories. Particular emphasis will be placed on the Italy-India collaboration, including the contributions of the Virgo detector, the development of LIGO-India, the prospects offered by the Einstein Telescope, and the synergy with satellite missions. Multi-messenger observations have a profound impact on relativistic astrophysics, the study of compact objects and fundamental physics, the origin of heavy elements, nuclear physics under extreme conditions, and cosmology. Looking to the future, the Italy-India partnership has the potential to become a strategic contributor to this field, strengthening global efforts toward the next generation of multi-messenger discoveries.

X-Rays for Indian Researchers: the Collaboration between Elettra and Indian Research Institutions (Synchrotron Physics)

• Giorgio Paolucci (Elettra-Sincrotone, Trieste)

Room: Seminar Hall Synchrotron radiation serves as a potent instrument for elucidating the structural and electronic characteristics of matter. Elettra, the Italian Synchrotron radiation laboratory, has a longstanding history of collaboration with Indian scientists. Presently, the Indian research community constitutes the second-largest community at Elettra, following the Italian one. Two of the instruments (beamlines) installed at Elettra are co-financed by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) through the Indian Institute of Science (IISc). As Elettra undergoes a significant upgrade, new avenues for the Indian community are anticipated in the forthcoming years.

The XRD2 and XPRESS Beamlines at Elettra Sincrotone Trieste (Synchrotron Physics)

• B Gopal (IISc, Bengaluru)

Room: Seminar Hall In this presentation we would describe the genesis, design and operations at the two Indo-Italian beamlines- XRD2 and XPRESS - at the Elettra Sincrotrone Trieste. Representative projects will be described that highlight the impact of access to these facilities on Indian researchers.