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ICTP Distinguished Conversation: Ignacio Cirac

The newly nominated ICTP-IBM Feynman Prize awardee talks with ICTP Director and ICTP quantum scientist
ICTP Distinguished Conversation: Ignacio Cirac
Ignacio Cirac interacts with the audience during one of his Salam Distinguished Lectures at ICTP in January 2026

The ICTP Distinguished Conversations are a series of informal discussions between eminent scientists and the ICTP Director Atish Dabholkar, often with other ICTP researchers. These exchanges showcase the excellence and the broad scientific spectrum of the research carried out at ICTP. They are also a way for ICTP to share insights from some of the brightest minds in modern science with its global community.

Just a few days after the announcement that Ignacio Cirac is the first winner of the ICTP-IBM Prize in Quantum Computing, and ahead of the award ceremony, ICTP releases his distinguished interview. In this video, ICTP Director Atish Dabholkar and ICTP quantum researcher Marcello Dalmonte talk with Cirac about his role in bridging fundamental concepts in quantum mechanics with their technological applications, particularly through his contributions to entanglement theory, quantum simulation, and tensor-network methods.

Cirac and Peter Zoller were the 2026 ICTP Salam Distinguished Lecturers. You can watch their lectures here.

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