Group members

Les Calanques, a short walk from our offices

Our group is currently supported by the A*MIDEX Chaire d’Excellence project, “Quantumness: combinatorial, computational, and distributed” (QCCD).

We are part of the Calcul Naturel (CANA) team at the Laboratoire d’Informatique & des Systèmes (LIS), Aix-Marseille University (AMU).

PhD student

Nasra Daher Ahmed

Nasra joined us on October 1, 2024, funded by the QuanTEdu-France consortium, and co-supervised by Ognyan Oreshkov. Nasra completed her Master in Physics at the Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Brussels, Belgium.

Postdocs

Leonardo Vaglini

Leonardo Vaglini joined us on January 1, 2025, funded by the A*MIDEX QCCD project. Leonardo was born and raised in Pisa (Italy), where he graduated in theoretical physics with a dissertation on phenomenology of particle physics. In 2019 he moved to Pavia, a small town in Lombardy (Northern Italy), close to Milan, where he joined the Quantum Information Theory (QUIT) group and obtained his PhD under the supervision of Paolo Perinotti. During his stay in Pavia as a PhD student and then as a postdoctoral researcher, he developed a strong interest in quantum foundations and quantum information, with a particular focus on operational theories and (quantum) causal structures. He enjoys spending most of his free time playing acoustic guitar or playing chess.

Shashaank Khanna

Shashaank Khanna joined us on March 1, 2025, supported by the A*MIDEX QCCD project. Shashaank finished his Master’s in Physics from Indian Institute of Technology, Indore, having done his Master’s thesis in Entanglement distribution at the Harish Chandra Research Institute. Since his Bachelor’s, he was highly interested in Quantum Foundations and wanted to work in it, hence for his PhD he decided to work with Matthew Pusey and Roger Colbeck at the University of York. Throughout his PhD he worked on causality in the context of explaining quantum correlations and implications of Bell inequality violations. His PhD dealt largely with exploring causal structures that can support non-classical quantum correlations. He also worked on accelerating the Fourier-Motzkin elimination algorithm. During his PhD he also had a short stint as a PhD intern with the Quantum Computing company, Riverlane, where he tried to learn about quantum algorithms and worked on mathematically approximating various functions. He remains intrigued by the various fundamental problems in the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics and is eager to understand how Quantum Mechanics affects our understanding of causality. Besides these, he is also very interested in General Relativity, trying to understand what implications General Relativity has on Quantum Information tasks. In his free time, he loves playing badminton, tennis and squash. He also likes travelling, hiking, and climbing occasionally.

Jacopo Surace

Jacopo Surace joined us on March 1, 2025, supported by the A*MIDEX QCCD project. Born and raised in Trieste, Italy, he obtained a degree in theoretical physics before completing a PhD in condensed matter physics at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. His doctoral research focused on the role of entanglement in many-body systems. Following his PhD, Jacopo undertook a postdoctoral position in the Quantum Information group led by Antonio Acín at ICFO, Barcelona, where he worked on a diverse range of topics, including condensed matter physics, quantum information, computability, and the foundations of quantum inference. This experience guided him towards the field of quantum foundations and led to an independent postdoctoral fellowship in the Quantum Foundations group at the Perimeter Institute, under the supervision of Rob Spekkens. There, his research centred on axiomatic reconstructions of quantum mechanics, the foundations of probability theory, and quantum reference frames.

Shintaro Minagawa

Shintaro Minagawa joined us on May 1, 2025, supported by the A*MIDEX QCCD project. He grew up in Nagoya in Japan, and after receiving his Bachelor’s degree in earth and planetary science from Kyushu University, he began his graduate studies in theoretical quantum information at Nagoya University under the supervision of Prof. Francesco Buscemi. In his Master’s program, he conducted research on the operational positioning of entropy based on consistency with the second law of thermodynamics. During his PhD course, he focused on quantum measurement processes and engaged in research on thermodynamics of quantum measurement processes and the resource theory of incompatibility of quantum measurement processes. He is interested in the operational and quantitative understanding of the fundamental aspects of quantum theory and its connection to quantum information processing and physics. When quantum becomes too challenging for him, he seeks healing in classical (Japanese and Chinese classical literature).

Publications and preprints by group members

  1. No-go theorem for quantum realization of extremal correlations, Sujan V.K and R. Kunjwal, arXiv:2509.14879 (2025).
  2. On whether quantum theory needs complex numbers: the foil theories perspective, Yìlè Yīng, Maria Ciudad Alañón, Daniel Centeno, Jacopo Surace, Marina Maciel Ansanelli, Ruizhi Liu, David Schmid, Robert W. Spekkens, arXiv:2506.08091 (2025).
  3. Disentangling signalling and causal influence, by Kathleen Barsse, Paolo Perinotti, Alessandro Tosini, Leonardo Vaglini, arXiv:2505.14120 (2025).
  4. Qualitative equivalence between incompatibility and Bell nonlocality, S.A. Yadavalli, N. Andrejic, and R. Kunjwal, Phys. Rev. A 110, L060201 (2024).
  5. Generalizing Bell nonlocality without global causal assumptions, R. Kunjwal and O. Oreshkov, arXiv:2411.11397 (2024).

Academic visits and talks by group members

  1. Leonardo attended YQIS 2025 at ICFO, Barcelona, October 6-10, 2025.
  2. Jacopo visited Shuming Cheng at Tsongji University, Shanghai, China, September 8-11, 2025.
  3. Shintaro visited the University of Osaka, September 16-17, 2025.
  4. Leonardo attended IQIS 2025 in Bologna, Italy, September 8-12, 2025.
  5. Shintaro organised and attended the 100th anniversary of quantum mechanics “Quantum foundation and quantum information: past and future” at Kyoto University, Japan, September 8-12, 2025.
  6. Shintaro visited the Takagi Quantum Information Theory Group, The University of Tokyo, Japan, September 1-5, 2025. He gave a seminar, A resource theory for the sharpness of quantum measurements.
  7. Shashaank visited Jonathan Barrett and Matty Hoban, giving a talk in the Oxford Quantum Group, Characterising causal structures that can support classical-quantum gaps, on August 29, 2025.
  8. Shashaank attended the SEEQA 2025 workshop at the University of Oxford, UK, August 25-29, 2025.
  9. Nasra visited the research group Fundamentos de Mecânica Quântica, Federal University of Paraná, during August 21-25, 2025. She gave a talk, When can you trade causal order for locality?
  10. Nasra attended the Paraty Quantum 2025 School and Workshop, August 4-15, 2025. She presented the poster, When can you trade causal order for locality?
  11. Shashaank gave a talk (online) at AQIS 2025, Characterising causal structures that can support classical-quantum gaps, on August 4, 2025.
  12. Jacopo attended AQIS 2025 at the University of Hong Kong, August 4-9, 2025. He gave a talk, Real amplitude quantum theory and foil theories.
  13. Ravi visited Stefano Pironio’s group at the Laboratoire d’Information Quantique (LIQ), Université libre de Bruxelles, July/August 2025.
  14. Jacopo attended Horizons of Quantum Information II at Haikou, Hainan University, July 27-August 1, 2025. He gave a talk, Time reversal in classical mechanics, quantum mechanics and real-amplitude quantum theory.
  15. Ravi visited John Selby and Ana Belén Sainz at the International Centre for Theory of Quantum Technologies (ICTQT), Gdansk, Poland, July 2025.
  16. Ravi visited Michał Oszmaniec and Remigiusz Augusiak’s groups at the Centre for Theoretical Physics PAS, Warsaw, Poland, July 2025.
  17. Nasra, Ravi, and Shintaro attended QPL 2025 in Varna, Bulgaria, July 14-18, 2025. Nasra presented the poster, When can you trade causal order for locality?
  18. Shintaro gave a talk at the CANA seminar, Quantum measurement processes consistent with the second law of thermodynamics, July 1, 2025.
  19. Nasra attended the Kefalonia Foundations 2025 – Workshop on the Theoretical and Conceptual Foundations of Quantum Physics at Tselentata, Kefalonia, Greece, June 22-27, 2025.
  20. Ravi visited Matty Hoban and Jonathan Barrett at the University of Oxford, Oxford, UK, in June 2025. He gave a talk, What is nonclassical about indefinite causal order?, on June 25, 2025.
  21. Ravi visited Matthew Pusey, Roger Colbeck, and Victoria Wright at the University of York, York, UK, in June 2025. He gave a talk, What is nonclassical about indefinite causal order?, on June 24, 2025.
  22. Ravi visited Mina Doosti at the University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK, in June 2025.
  23. Shintaro and Shashaank attended the Summer School on Mathematical Aspects of Quantum Information, June 16-20, 2025, at Université Paris-Saclay, France.
  24. Shashaank attended and gave a talk, Which causal scenarios can support non-classical correlations?, at Foundations 2025, June 30-July 2, 2025, at ICTQT Gdansk, Poland. He also gave this talk in the ICTQT group seminar on July 3, 2025.
  25. Nasra visited Ognyan Oreshkov at QuIC, ULB, Brussels, Belgium, between June 2-13, 2025.
  26. Nasra, Shashaank, and Shintaro attended the Porquerolles quantum summer school, Mathematics and Physics of Quantum Computing and Quantum Learning, May 23-28, 2025.
  27. Nasra attended the QISS 2025 workshop in Vienna, Austria, April 14-17, 2025, presenting the poster, When can you trade causal order for locality?
  28. Ravi gave an online seminar, What is nonclassical about indefinite causal order?, on April 14, 2025, at Quantum Meets, IIIT-Hyderabad, India. [Video]
  29. Nasra and Shashaank attended the WE-Heraeus-Seminar on Operator Theory and Polynomial Optimization in Quantum Information Theory, Bad Honnef, Germany, March 11-14, 2025. Nasra presented the poster, When can you trade causal order for locality?
  30. Nasra gave a talk at the CANA seminar, Introduction to quantum information theory, on March 4, 2025.
  31. Ravi visited Ognyan Oreshkov at the Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium, February 14-24, 2025.
  32. Ravi visited Prabha Mandayam at IIT Madras, Chennai, India. He gave the talk, Generalizing Bell nonlocality without global causal assumptions, on January 16, 2025.
  33. Ravi visited Manabendra N. Bera and Sandeep K. Goyal at IISER Mohali, Sahibzada Ajit Singh Nagar, India. He gave the talk, Qualitative equivalence between incompatibility and Bell nonlocality, on January 9, 2025.
  34. Ravi visited Frédéric Dupuis and colleagues at the Université de Montréal, Montréal, Québec, Canada, September 2024. He gave the talk, Trading causal order for locality, on September 27, 2024.
  35. Ravi visited Rob Spekkens at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, September 2024. He also attended Causalworlds 2024, with the contributed talk, Generalizing Bell nonlocality without global causal assumptions, on September 17, 2024.
  36. Ravi gave an invited talk, Generalizing Bell nonlocality without global causal assumptions, on September 9, 2024, at the Chaire Jean Morlet Workshop on Bridges between Machine Learning and Quantum Information Science, Centre international de rencontres mathématiques (CIRM), Marseille, France.
  37. Ravi gave an invited talk (online), Trading causal order for locality, on August 31, 2024, at the AQIS 2024 Satellite Workshop on Fundamental Aspects of Quantum Information, Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan.
  38. Ravi visited Ognyan Oreshkov at the Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium, July 2024. He also attended IQSA 2024, with the contributed talk: Generalizing Bell nonlocality without global causal assumptions, on July 24, 2024.
  39. Ravi visited Damian Markham at LIP6, Sorbonne Université, Paris, France, July 2024. He gave the talk, Generalizing Bell nonlocality without global causal assumptions, on July 4, 2024.
  40. Ravi visited Rob Spekkens at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, April-May 2024. He attended the FoQaCia workshop where he gave an invited talk, Contextuality, entanglement, magic: many qubits, many questions, on May 2, 2024.
  41. Ravi visited Ognyan Oreshkov at the Université libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium, April 2024.

Academic visitors

Ion Nechita, LPT (Toulouse, France), December 8-9, 2025.

Zixuan Liu, ULB (Brussels, Belgium), from November 19-21, 2025.

Julian Wechs, ULB (Brussels, Belgium), from November 17-21, 2025.

Jonas Kitzinger, FU Berlin (Berlin, Germany), from April 28-May 2, 2025.

Jonas gave a CANA seminar, “Introduction to benchmarking and certification of quantum computers”, summarising aspects of his PhD research.

Beata Zjawin, ICTQT (Gdańsk, Poland), from January 21-24, 2025.

Beata gave a group seminar on “EPR assemblages as common-cause resources of nonclassicality”, summarising much of her PhD research. We also had discussions surrounding contextuality during her visit, besides (of course!) a short hike towards the Calanques.

Hippolyte Dourdent, ICFO (Barcelona, Spain), from November 19-22, 2024.

Hippolyte gave a talk to the second year Master’s students in Informatics and Discrete Mathematics as part of their tutored seminar course on Scientific Communication in English. We had discussions surrounding causality and trading it for locality during his visit!

Julian Wechs, ULB (Brussels, Belgium), from November 11-15, 2024.

We had a lot of fun discussing quantum causality, nomicity, and antinomicity!

Tomáš Gonda, University of Innsbruck (Austria), from October 6-10, 2024.

Tomáš gave a talk on an abstract framework for universality in physics, computer science, and beyond. We had discussions ranging from topics in causality, contextuality, and resource theories during his visit!