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Cinthia Huerta Alderete

Alumni

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Recent News

  • an AI-generated artistic image showing swirling quantum particles on a circular stage lit by lights from above

    Putting On a Particle Play

    August 18, 2023

    Back in the 1950s, theoretical physicists postulated that the kinds of particles we actually see in nature are just the tip of the iceberg. Many other types of particles with weird properties, which they termed paraparticles, were popping out of the math as theoretical possibilities. But as physicists discovered more about the fundamental particles seen in nature, they found no evidence for paraparticles. In 2016 Cinthia Alderete, then a graduate student in theoretical physics, discovered a way to simulate paraparticles in which ions and light come together to put on a paraparticle play. To direct this dramatic reenactment, Alderete made the switch from theory to experiment and moved from Mexico to the United States, collaborating with the group of Norbert Linke, a member of the NSF Quantum Leap Challenge Institute for Robust Quantum Simulation and a former Fellow of the Joint Quantum Institute. Together, they brought to life an obscure theoretical curiosity from the past.

  • A photo of Alderete, Nguyen and Linke

    JQI Quantum Computing Results Selected as “Top Pick” by IEEE Micro

    July 1, 2020

    Research by a team that includes JQI Fellow Norbert Linke, UMD physics graduate student Nhung Hong Nguyen, and visiting graduate student Cinthia Huerta Alderete has been selected as one of the 2019 Top Picks in Computer Architecture by IEEE Micro. The work, compared different kinds of quantum computers.