Draft:Graeme Smith

Smith earned his Bachelor of Science in physics from the University of Toronto in 2001, and went on to receive a Master of Science in 2004 and a Ph.D. in 2006 in physics from the California Institute of Technology. His doctoral research at Caltech was supervised by theoretical physicist John Preskill.{{cite web |date=March 28, 2024 |title=Professor Graeme Smith – Degrees (Common CV extract) |url=https://uwaterloo.ca/institute-for-quantum-computing/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/ccv-graemesmith.pdf |accessdate=21 May 2025 |publisher=University of Waterloo |quote=2006/6 Doctorate, Physics, California Institute of Technology (Supervisors: John Preskill, 2003/6–2006/6)}}

After completing his Ph.D., Smith worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Computer Science at the University of Bristol from 2006 to 2007. He then joined the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, where he was a postdoctoral fellow from 2007 to 2010 and subsequently a Research Staff Member from 2010 until 2016. In 2016, Smith was appointed as an assistant professor of physics at the University of Colorado Boulder. At Colorado, he became a Fellow of JILA (the joint institute of CU Boulder and NIST) and later served as the director of CU Boulder's Center for Theory of Quantum Matter. He was promoted to associate professor at Colorado and remained on the faculty there until 2023.

In July 2023, Smith joined the University of Waterloo as a faculty member of the Institute for Quantum Computing and an associate professor in the Department of Applied Mathematics. He also became an affiliate of the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics and retains an adjoint affiliation with JILA.{{cite web |title=Graeme Stewart Baird Smith – Personal Website |url=https://gsbsmith.ca/ |accessdate=21 May 2025 |quote=I am an Associate Professor in Applied Mathematics... also a member of IQC, an affiliate at Perimeter and a Fellow Adjoint at JILA.}}

Smith’s research focuses on the theory of quantum information—extending classical information theory (Shannon theory) to quantum mechanical systems—and the fundamental limits of information storage, transmission, and processing in quantum systems.{{cite web |title=Graeme Smith – Research Interests |url=https://www.colorado.edu/physics/graeme-smith |accessdate=21 May 2025 |publisher=University of Colorado Boulder, Department of Physics |quote=My main research interests are quantum information and quantum computing. I try to identify the fundamental limits that physics places on communication, information processing, and sensing...}} He has worked on problems in quantum error correction, quantum channel capacities, quantum communication in noisy environments, and the mathematical properties of entropy in quantum mechanics.{{cite web |date=2023 |title=APS Fellows Archive – 2023 Fellows (Division of Quantum Information) |url=https://aps.org/funding-recognition/aps-fellowship |accessdate=21 May 2025 |publisher=American Physical Society |quote=...fundamental contributions on quantum channel capacities including proving continuity... and providing a classification of all the additive entropic formulas.}}

In 2008, Smith and fellow researcher Jon Yard discovered the phenomenon of superactivation of quantum channel capacity: they showed that there exist pairs of quantum communication channels, each with zero quantum capacity on its own, that can have a positive capacity when used together.{{cite journal |last1=Smith |first1=Graeme |last2=Yard |first2=Jon |year=2008 |title=Quantum Communication with Zero-Capacity Channels |journal=Science |volume=321 |issue=5897 |pages=1812–1815 |doi=10.1126/science.1164382 |pmid=18818360|pmc=2570747 }}{{cite news |date=October 6, 2008 |title=In quantum channels, zero plus zero can equal non-zero |url=https://phys.org/news/2008-10-quantum-channels-equal-non-zero.html |accessdate=21 May 2025 |work=Phys.org |quote=Smith and Yard show that some pairs of zero-capacity channels can have a positive quantum capacity when used together, revealing that quantum capacity is not additive like classical capacity.}} This counterintuitive result, published in Science, was the first example of a quantum channel capacity superactivation and demonstrated that quantum information channels can exhibit non-additivity in their capacities.{{cite news |date=October 6, 2008 |title=In quantum channels, zero plus zero can equal non-zero |url=https://phys.org/news/2008-10-quantum-channels-equal-non-zero.html |accessdate=21 May 2025 |work=Phys.org |quote=...like two cut telephone cables being able to transmit data when used together. Their finding shows that quantum capacity is not additive and that the capacity of a single channel does not fully describe its potential for transmitting quantum information.}}

Smith has also contributed to proving continuity bounds for quantum channel capacities and classified conditions under which certain entropic formulas remain additive in quantum information theory. He is an advocate for accurate science communication in quantum computing, often countering misconceptions about the field in public forums.

• Fellow of the American Physical Society (APS) – Elected in 2023 for “fundamental contributions on quantum channel capacities including proving continuity, elucidating the phenomenon of superactivation, and providing a classification of all the additive entropic formulas.”
• NSF CAREER Award – Received in 2017 from the U.S. National Science Foundation for early-career research excellence (grant CCF-1652560).{{cite journal |author1=Leditzky, F. |author2=Leung, D. |author3=Siddhu, V. |author4=Smith, G. |author5=Smolin, J. A. |year=2018 |title=The Platypus of the Quantum Channel Zoo |journal=IEEE Transactions on Information Theory |volume=64 |issue=4 |pages=2461–2473 |doi=10.1109/TIT.2017.2776905 |doi-broken-date=22 May 2025 |quote=He was awarded an NSF CAREER Award in 2016.}}
• Outstanding Postdoctoral Mentor Award, University of Colorado Boulder – Awarded in 2021 for excellence in mentoring postdoctoral researchers.{{cite web |date=September 16, 2021 |title=JILA Fellows Thomas Perkins and Graeme Smith win the 2021 Outstanding Postdoc Mentor Award |url=https://jila.colorado.edu/news-events/news/jila-fellows-thomas-perkins-and-graeme-smith-win-2021-outstanding-postdoc-mentor |accessdate=21 May 2025 |publisher=JILA, University of Colorado |quote=JILA Fellow Graeme Smith also won the 2021 Outstanding Postdoc Mentor Award...}}
• Faculty of Mathematics Golden Jubilee Research Excellence Award – University of Waterloo, 2024 (mid-career category), recognizing outstanding research contributions.