Pedro Lopes’ career path took him from São Paulo, Brazil, to Vancouver and Sherbrooke in Canada, and finally to Boston, in the United States, working mostly in quantum matter and the physics of materials and devices, eventually making his way into the seemingly predetermined topic of quantum information.
Lopes completed his bachelor’s of science in physics and his PhD in condensed matter physics at the Universidade Estadual de Campinas in São Paulo, Brazil. He became interested in what lay beyond the classical while working with his supervisor, Amir Caldeira, who was one of the first to envision theoretical analyses of macroscopic quantum tunneling that ended up receiving the 2025 Nobel Prize in physics.
“The kind of physics I was exposed to early on was at the core of what later became the physics of superconducting qubits,” Lopes explains, “so I had an exposure to quantum information from my late undergrad and throughout my PhD, but not directly.” He says he was, at the time, more interested in the physics of materials, particularly topological matter, than in quantum devices and open systems.
After his PhD, Lopes’ postdoctoral experience at the Institut quantique de l'Université de Sherbrooke in Quebec also came with a lot of indirect exposure to quantum information. Although he did not work on it directly, it was a popular research topic at Sherbrooke.
Things started to change once Lopes moved to the University of British Columbia in Vancouver for his second postdoc, where he worked with Ian Affleck. During this move, Lopes’ work was “pretty close to the topic of designing next-gen topological qubits,” which he says was a “progressive move” in his career towards the field of quantum information.
In Vancouver, he began volunteering for activities that aimed to educate the general public and incoming undergraduates, one such educational topic being quantum information. This experience with public engagement helped him decide two years into his UBC postdoc to “change gears and start doing something that was a little more connected to society,” which further led him to become a Program Manager at the Stewart Blusson Quantum Matter Institute, part of the Grand Challenges program at UBC. “It was this big program for trying to identify key questions they were particularly at a place to answer, and one of the topics was involving quantum computing.”
Lopes then moved his talents to Boston, where he joined neutral-atom quantum computing company QuEra Computing at their “humble beginnings” in 2022, originally as a Business Developer.
“Basically, I was the business team,” Lopes laughs, “it was me and the CEO, and it was a good experience for me to learn the tech, and to have the time to learn new concepts and develop new skills, both managerial and entrepreneurial.”
QuEra launched the first neutral-atom quantum computer to become available to the public, called Aquila, in 2022. Lopes helped build the user community program for Aquila, which resulted in him leading the education team at QuEra for the next two years.
“As the business grew, I talked to the CEO, and we got someone else to lead the business side of things, and I got to focus on the science side again,” Lopes recalls, “so that’s when I became the Quantum Advocate.” This position entailed acting as a liaison between national labs and the scientific community, as well as creating research and user programs on top of QuEra’s systems.
Lopes finally settled back into his scientist roots in March of 2025. “It actually took me six years to pivot from research in quantum matter to research in quantum information, really by doing something else. It was not planned for,” he says. He now holds the title of Senior Quantum Scientist at QuEra.
At his new position, Lopes works trying to connect algorithms and hardware through quantum error correction and fault tolerance. “The hardware provides physical limitations, and the error correction provides the bridge between the physical limitations of the hardware and the requirements of the algorithms,” he explains. “While I don’t develop the error correction, I do ensure that I create computer architecture that allows me to stitch these three things efficiently to be able to run the algorithms properly and as fast as possible.”
QuEra has recently announced a push to accomplish the first “million error-free operations” in the next two years. “We are excited about large-scale fault-tolerant quantum computing,” Lopes says, “but are quantum computers useful? To do science, I can clearly answer ‘yes.’ They are today. We don’t need to wait. We are finding things out, and, arguably, the key early applications of quantum computing are going to be scientific.” Lopes also says there are new findings — publishing soon in a recently accepted Nature paper — where QuEra’s science team used Aquila to find new phenomena in quantum dynamical phase transitions.
As for students in the physical sciences, Lopes says, “I’ve been to many places, and I changed positions and jobs many times, and I know that it’s quite scary to do that alone. There’s a lot of anxiety involved in that. I often feel lucky to be where I am.” He speaks of his non-linear path: “What I think that got me here is an honest passion for physics. In my case, I just love it. I love studying. I love learning. Working in research is about producing knowledge.” Some may say the output of research should be a product of some sort, but Lopes strongly stands on the ground that “the output of research is knowledge.”
“It’s very clear to me what I am passionate about; what I dream about,” Lopes says. “I’m a dreamer, definitely, and I just chose what was closest to my dream at every instant of my life. When it was time to not do science, I did not hesitate: I did not do science. When it was time to go back and do science, I did not hesitate: I came back and did science.”
Outside of his research at QuEra, Lopes loves playing the Irish Fiddle (as he “hates reading sheet music”), cooking, and volunteering at the National Park Services in Boston with his wife.