Fabio Anza
Department of Physics
UMBC
12 noon–1pm
Friday, November 14, 2025
Remotely via WebEx: https://umbc.webex.com/meet/sherman
Abstract:
Randomness is a cornerstone of classical and quantum information science, underpinning secure communication, device
benchmarking, simulation, the study of thermalization, generative processes, and more. In this talk, I will discuss my
ongoing efforts on understanding randomness in quantum systems, with the purpose of designing pseudorandom quantum
state generators. After a brief introduction to the existing theory of random quantum states, I will present a novel approach
that I have been developing, grounded on geometric quantum mechanics. By reframing quantum mechanics as a classical
theory on a curved state space, this approach aims at adapting the vast knowledge from classical information theory and
dynamical systems theory to build accurate, flexible, and efficient random quantum state generators.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Fabio Anza earned his PhD from the University of Oxford in 2018, working on the dynamical foundations of
statistical mechanics and quantum gravity. He then moved to the Complexity Sciences Center at the University of
California, Davis as Templeton Independent Research Fellow, where he developed his geometric approach to open
quantum systems. In 2021, he joined the physics faculty at the University of Washington (UW) as Research Assistant
Professor, hired by the InQubator for Quantum Simulations. After a year at UW, he took a career break to support his
wife’s career. Between 2021 and 2023, he built Kernel Science—a company offering AI, scientific software and
consulting services. In 2024, he was hired by UMBC, where he leads the Complex Quantum Systems research group (
https://cqs.umbc.edu/ ).
Email: fanza@umbc.edu URL: https://physics.umbc.edu/people/faculty/anza/
Host:
Alan T. Sherman, sherman@umbc.edu
Support for this event was provided in part by the National Science Foundation under SFS grant DGE-1753681.
The UMBC Cyber Defense Lab meets biweekly Fridays 12-1pm. All meetings are open to the public.
Upcoming CDL meetings:
Nov 28, 2025: Thanksgiving weekend
Dec 12, 2025: Alan Sherman and Enis Golazewski, Security Analysis of the SecureDNA System