Prof. Stephen Bartlett

Professor Stephen Bartlett is pursuing fundamental research in the theory of quantum physics. His particular focus is on quantum information theory, including the theory of quantum computing, as well as the foundational issues of quantum mechanics.

Professor Bartlett completed his PhD in mathematical physics at the University of Toronto in 2000. Moving to Australia, he directed his research to the theory of quantum computing, first as a Macquarie University Research Fellow and then as an ARC Postdoctoral Research Fellow at The University of Queensland. Since 2005, he has lead a research program in theoretical quantum physics at University of Sydney, with interests spanning quantum computing, quantum measurement and control, quantum many-body systems, and the foundations of quantum theory.

Major funding support

Professor Bartlett has held a career total of five ARC Discovery Project grants. He is an investigator in the U.S. government IARPA-funded program on Multi-Qubit Coherent Operations using electron spins, funded at $27.5M over 4 years (2010-2014) with $1M/yr to Sydney. This is the most significant international research effort in this area, lead by Prof Charles Marcus at the the Niels Bohr Institute, Denmark and involving Chief Investigators from Harvard, Maryland, UCSB, Delft, Tokyo, Basel, Purdue, and 3 CIs at the University of Sydney.  Professor Bartlett is also a CI on major quantum computing projects in photonic quantum computation and quantum characterization, verification and validation funded through the U.S. government quantum computing programs.

Mentoring and research training

Along with Professor Andrew Doherty and Associate Professor Steven Flammia, Professor Bartlett leads the theoretical quantum physics group at the University of Sydney. The group is 26 strong, with five postgraduate Honours students this year, 11 PhD students and seven postdoctoral researchers. Currently he supervises six PhD students. He has graduated seven PhD students over the past five years, two of whom have received awards for the best PhD thesis in their year in the School of Physics at the University of Sydney. He has also supervised three MSc students and 17 Honours students since 2005, with nine of these Honours students receiving the University Medal. If you are interested in working or studying with Professor Bartlett, please contact him.