Australian quantum computing star Michelle Simmons has joined Stephen Hawking, Albert Einstein and Alexander Graham Bell as an elected member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
If that company alone fails to make a scientist blanch, consider that since 1780, the Academy also choses the leading "thinkers and doers" from each generation, including the first US president George Washington, polymath Benjamin Franklin and civil rights trailblazer Martin Luther King, to become part of its elite.
Professor Simmons, who teaches at the University of New South Wales, joins only 10 other Australians as Academy members.
As a physicist, Professor Simmons harnesses the power of atoms to develop super-fast, super-small devices that can process huge amounts of data. The ultimate aim of researchers in this field is to develop a commercially-viable quantum supercomputer that can complete in days extraordinarily complex tasks which currently take decades.
Her 20-strong UNSW research group developed the world’s smallest working transistor, an essential component of a future quantum computer. The research was published in Nature Nanotechnology in 2012, 10 years ahead of predictions by global chip manufacturers.
The team also was the only one in the world able to make atomically precise devices in silicon, including the thinnest conducting wires yet produced. They are 1000 times narrower than human hair.
"It’s tough and very hard work but unbelievably rewarding and exciting," Professor Simmons said. "I am incredibly honoured by the recognition from the Academy.
"We are working to achieve the ultimate in computer miniaturisation – to develop components for the world’s first quantum integrated circuit where all elements are constructed on the atomic scale.
"Looking historically, conventional computers were first developed in 1947. It took them roughly 10 years to get the world's integrated circuit and another five to 10 years the first commercial products.
‘‘We are now mirroring that. It’s really now you can see the end goal for quantum computers. We believe it's transformational work."
UNSW President and Vice-Chancellor Professor Fred Hilmer said Professor Simmons had established herself as a quantum computing pioneer, building a formidable research team.
"Under her leadership, the group has achieved a number of world-first research breakthroughs," he said.
Over the past decade, her list of achievements included being awarded the Australian Academy of Science’s Pawsey Medal in 2005. COSMOS magazine named her one of Australia’s top 10 scientific minds under 45 and she was also listed among the Sydney Morning Herald’s 100 most influential people. In 2012, she was named NSW Scientist of the Year.
As one of the oldest learned societies and independent policy research centres in the United States, the Academy convenes leaders from the academic, business, and government sectors to address critical global challenges.
Its members include more than 200 Nobel Prize laureates and 100 Pulitzer Prize winners
Through studies, publications, and programs on the Humanities, Arts, and Education; Science, Engineering, and Technology; Global Security and Energy; and American Institutions and the Public Good, it provides policy advice to decision-makers in government, academia, and the private sector.
The induction ceremony for Professor Simmons will be held at the Academy’s headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts on October 11.
