The Speakers

Vassilios Pantazopoulos leads NVIDIA's Accelerated Quantum Research Center (NVAQC), the company's flagship quantum research center dedicated to shortening the timeline to useful quantum computing.

Yasunari Suzuki received his Ph.D. in Engineering from the Department of Applied Physics, Graduate School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo in 2018, and joined NTT Laboratories in the same year. Since 2025, he has served as a Team Director at the RIKEN Center for Quantum Computing. He has been engaged in research and development of quantum computing, with a particular focus on software and computer systems for the development and implementation of fault-tolerant quantum computers.

Laura Schulz is Lead for Quantum Innovation at the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility, where she works on integrating quantum systems into HPC and AI environments. She holds a joint appointment at Northwestern University. She previously led quantum-HPC integration efforts in the Munich Quantum Valley, and before that worked in the Computation directorate at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

Nate Gemelke is Co-Founder and Chief Technology Strategist at QuEra Computing, where he helps define the company’s long-term technical vision, supports the development, scaling, and deployment of neutral-atom quantum computing systems and works with QueRa’s largest government agencies. QuEra is delivering practical quantum computing by integrating these systems with today’s powerful classical hardware and using AI to improve error correction. QueEra’s approach positions quantum as a real part of tomorrow’s computing stack—not distant-future technology.

Gemelke previously served as Chief Technology Officer, overseeing core hardware and software development, recruiting world-class scientists and engineers, and engaging with partners and users across industry, government, and academia.

Dr. Gemelke’s career bridges fundamental physics and applied quantum technology. Prior to QuEra, he was a Research Associate at Harvard University working on quantum information processing with neutral atoms, and an Assistant Professor of Physics at Penn State University, where his research focused on laser cooling, many-body physics, and quantum statistical mechanics.

Nate Gemelke has been recognized for his contributions to quantum computing and is the recipient of many notable awards including The Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow Award.  In addition, he has several patents in various stages of approval for his methods and inventions in this field.

He earned his PhD in Physics from Stanford University, where his research on degenerate atomic Bose gases and topological phases was advised by Nobel Laureate Steven Chu. He holds a BS in Applied Mathematics, Engineering, and Physics from the University of Wisconsin–Madison. Dr. Gemelke is passionate about translating cutting-edge physics into scalable quantum technologies with practical impact.

Pranav Gokhale is Infleqtion’s Chief Technology Officer. He was previously the co-founder and CEO of Super.tech, which was acquired by Infleqtion (ColdQuanta) in May 2022. Pranav has a PhD in quantum computer science from UChicago, where his research led to three best paper awards, over a dozen publications, and three patents. His work spans the full stack of quantum technology, from low-level pulse optimization to compilation to fault-tolerant quantum algorithm design and benchmarking. Pranav’s key application focus is the intersection of quantum technology and AI.

Abdella Battou is a senior researcher in the Quantum Communications Division within The Communication Technology Lab at NIST. His interest is in performance evaluation of Optical and Quantum Networking Architectures and in developing robust infrastructure measurements and protocols to support large-scale AI applications’ challenges. From 2012 to 2023 he served as Division Chief of the Advanced Network Technologies Division with the Information Technology Lab and from 2023 to 2025 as the Division Chief of the Smart Connected systems Division in the Communications Technology Laboratory. 

David Nadlinger is a Junior Research Fellow at Merton College and the Ion Trap Quantum Computing Group at the University of Oxford. His recent work focuses on high-precision control of atomic qubits, particularly for fast, high-fidelity optical networking of trapped-ion processors. He holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford for work including the first demonstration of fully device-independent quantum key distribution, and an MSc in Physics from ETH Zürich. David's personal interests include computer architecture and programming language design; he is a prolific contributor to various open-source compilers and libraries.

John Jarman is the International Technical Lead at Nu Quantum, a Cambridge, UK-based startup focused on building the quantum networking hardware needed to achieve fault-tolerant quantum computing at scale. Prior to joining Nu Quantum, John studied at the University of Cambridge, completing his PhD on gallium nitride single-photon emitters in 2019. At Nu Quantum, he has focused on developing the photonic hardware underpinning the Entanglement Fabric, before relocating to the US to establish Nu Quantum’s US office. He is currently based in Los Angeles.

Alexander Pirker is a Senior-PostDoc at the University of Innsbruck in the group of Wolfgang Dür, and CEO of Quantum Network Design. His main research fields and interests are quantum network architectures and protocols, their control frameworks, simulations and protocol stacks. But he is also interested in other topics, such as entanglement purification protocols, quantum cryptography and measurement-based quantum computing. He served as co-chair of the track on Simulators, Demonstrations, Prototypes and Testbeds at QCNC 2025 and QCNC 2026 as well as member of the technical program comitee for QCE25.

Aharon Brodutch is a senior staff researcher on IonQ’s quantum error correction team. He holds a PhD in theoretical physics and quantum information from Macquarie University, and earned his M.Sc. and B.Sc. from Tel Aviv University. Between 2012 and 2020, he held postdoctoral positions at the Institute for Quantum Computing in Waterloo and the Centre for Quantum Information and Quantum Control in Toronto. He was a co-founder and CEO of Entangled Networks, a startup building solutions for distributed quantum computing, which was acquired by IonQ in 2022. Following the acquisition, he joined IonQ’s architecture team. 

Angela Sara Cacciapuoti is a Full Professor of Quantum Communications and Networks at the University of Naples Federico II, Italy, and co-founder of the Quantum Internet Research Group (www.quantuminternet.it). She is an ERC grantee and Principal Investigator of the ERC Consolidator Grant QNattyNet (https://qnattynet.quantuminternet.it), which aims to lay the foundations of a quantum-native Internet. Her research lies in quantum networking, spanning theoretical foundations, network architectures, and simulation tools.

Her contributions have received several distinctions, including the 2024 IEEE Communications Society Award for Advances in Communication, one of the Society’s most prestigious technical awards. She is currently an Area Editor for IEEE Transactions on Communications and a Senior Editor for the IEEE Journal on Selected Areas in Communications (JSAC) Quantum Series. She also serves on the editorial boards of npj Quantum Information, IEEE Transactions on Quantum Engineering, and IEEE Communications Surveys & Tutorials.

She actively contributes to the IRTF Quantum Internet Research Group (QIRG). Furthermore, she is involved in various capacities in European strategy and roadmapping initiatives for quantum communications and networking.