Daniel Gottesman

Perimeter Institute
31 Caroline Street North
Waterloo, ON N2L 2Y5
CANADA
Office Number: 425
Phone: (519) 569-7600x8581
Fax: (519) 569-7611
[email protected]

I am a faculty member at the Perimeter Institute in Waterloo, Ontario. I got my Ph.D. at Caltech in 1997, and did postdocs at Los Alamos National Lab and Microsoft Research, after which I served in the UC Berkeley CS department as a Long-Term CMI Prize Fellow with the Clay Mathematics Institute.

I currently work on quantum computation, particularly quantum error correction, fault-tolerant quantum computation, quantum complexity, and quantum cryptography.

I am best known for developing the stabilizer code formalism for creating and describing a large class of quantum codes, and for work on performing quantum gates using quantum teleportation.

I was named to the MIT Technology Review's TR100: Top Young Innovators for 2003, am a CIFAR Senior Fellow in the Quantum Information Science program, and an APS Fellow.

Research

Papers
- bibliographic info only, in reverse chronological order
- by category, with capsule summaries
Some recent work:
Some past work:
- Complexity of translationally-invariant spin systems (FOCS 2009, ToC 2013, arXiv:0905.2419 [quant-ph])
- Threshold for fault-tolerant quantum computation (QIC 2006, quant-ph/0504218)
- Uncloneable encryption (QIC 2003, quant-ph/0210062)
- Authentication of quantum messages (FOCS 2002, quant-ph/0205128)
- Quantum digital signatures (quant-ph/0105032)
- Digitizing continuous quantum variables (PRA 2001, quant-ph/0008040)
- Quantum secret sharing (PRL 1999, quant-ph/9901025)
- Teleporting quantum gates (Nature 1999, quant-ph/9908010)
- Stabilizer codes (Caltech Ph.D. thesis, quant-ph/9705052)
- Information loss in black hole evaporation
Some talks (some animations Mac-only):
- Properties needed for fault-tolerant quantum computation (PPT, Nov. 2005)
- Overview of work on fault-tolerance (PPT, Dec. 2006)
- Quantum public key cryptography (PPT, Dec. 2005)
- PI public lecture on quantum cryptography (April 2007), recording available at PIRSA:07040020.
- Long (4+ hours) tutorial on quantum error correction and fault tolerance (PPT, Aug. 2007)
- Complexity of one-dimensional spin chains (PPT, Oct. 2007)
- Colloquium on spin glasses and computational complexity (Oct. 2010), recording available at PIRSA:10100053.
- General principles of fault tolerance (PDF, Dec. 2011)
List of resources to learn about quantum error correction.
My CV.
Map of these pages.
Physics Today article on quantum cryptography (Nov. 2000 issue)

Teaching

Winter 2004: C&O 639 (Quantum Error Correction, at University of Waterloo)
Winter 2007: Quantum Error Correction (at Perimeter Institute)
Winter 2010: PSI Quantum Information Review (recorded lectures, at Perimeter Institute)
Winter 2011: PSI Quantum Information Review (recorded lectures, at Perimeter Institute)
Winter 2012: QIC 890/CO 781/CS 867 (Quantum Error Correction and Fault Tolerance, at University of Waterloo, co-taught with Debbie Leung)
Winter 2012: PSI Quantum Information Review
Winter 2014: QIC 890 (Quantum Error Correction and Fault Tolerance, at University of Waterloo, co-taught with Robert Koenig)
Winter 2015: PSI Quantum Information Review (recorded lectures, at Perimeter Institute)
Spring 2016: QIC 890/CS 867, Quantum Error Correction and Fault Tolerance (at University of Waterloo)

Hobbies and Interests

I am married to Lucy Zhang. We have one son.

Reading science fiction and fantasy
Role-playing games

Bridge
Soccer

Here is a fairy tale I wrote one morning while I was in graduate school: Snow White and the Seven Quarks. It should not be taken to be representative of my own graduate experience.

Read my quantum error correction sonnet.

I was tapped to give an after-dinner speech at the QIP 2002 conference, and spoke about the penetration of quantum computation into popular culture.

Last Updated: Apr. 13, 2017