QL2Q Lab

Muhammad Usman

Email: muhammad (dot) usman (at) csiro (dot) au OR musman (at) unimelb (dot) edu (dot) au

Biography:

Prof Muhammad Usman is Head of Quantum Systems and Principal Staff Member at CSIRO’s Data61 which is Australia's National Research Organisation. He has over 15 years of research and teaching experience in the field of quantum computing with a track-record over 100 research papers in high-impact international journals. Prof Usman is leading a team of over 20 researchers working at the forefront of quantum algorithms, quantum software engineering, and quantum security. He is a fellow of the Australian Institute of Physics (FAIP) and serves on the executive editorial boards of two international journals IOP Nano Futures and Nature Scientific Reports. He is a committee member of Standards Australia to help in standardisation of quantum technologies and have academic associations at the University of Melbourne, Monash University, and RMIT. Dr Usman was the Chair of Organising Committee (Conference General Chair) of International Conference on Quantum Techniques in Machine Learning 2024 (now a Steering Committee Member). He has delivered numerous invited talks in international conferences and has been invited on several panel discussions at national and international events. His work on Quantum ML was the Winner of the State of Victoria iAward 2024, Innovative of the Year 2023 Award by Defence Industry, Winner of the Australian Army Quantum Technology Challenge in three years in a row (2021, 2022 and 2023), Rising Stars in Computational Materials Science by Elsevier in 2020, and Dean’s Award for Excellence in Research (Early Career) at the University of Melbourne in 2019. Prof Usman is a recipient of prestigious international research fellowships from Fulbright USA (20005-2010) and DAAD Germany in 2010. He has received his PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Purdue University USA in 2010. Prof Usman is a passionate quantum educator and has been promoting quantum education among school children as part of the CSIRO’s STEM Scientists in Schools program.

Employments and Honorary Roles:

2025-current: Partner Investigator, ARC Training Center for Future Leaders in Quantum Computing (FLiQC), The University of Sydney Australia.

2025-current: Associate Investigator, ARC Center of Excellence in Quantum Biotechnology (QUBIC), The University of Queensland Australia

2025-current: Professor (F), School of Computing Technologies, RMIT University, Melbourne Australia.

2022-current: Head of Quantum Systems, Principal Research Staff, Data61 CSIRO, Clayton Victoria Australia.

2023-current: Adjunct Associate Professor (R), School of Physics, Monash University, Clayton Victoria Australia.

2022-current: Associate Professor (PT/H), School of Physics, The University of Melbourne Australia.

2020-2022: IBM Q Hub Academic, The University of Melbourne Australia.

2021-2022: Senior Research Fellow, School of Physics, ARC Center for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, The University of Melbourne Australia.

2019-2021: Senior Lecturer, School of Computing and Information Systems, Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology, The University of Melbourne Australia.

2014-2018: Senior Research Fellow, School of Physics, ARC Center for Quantum Computation and Communication Technology, The University of Melbourne Australia.

2010-2013: Post-doctoral Researcher, Tyndall National Institute, Cork, Ireland.

Education:

2010: PhD Electrical and Computer Engineering, Purdue University West Lafayette Indiana USA.

2005: MSc Electrical Engineering (Honours), University of Engineering and Technology Lahore.

2003: BSc Electrical Engineering (Honours & Distinction), University of Engineering and Technology Lahore.

Editorial Services

2021-current: Member Executive Editorial Board, IOP Nature Futures journal

2021-current: Member Editorial Board, IOP Modeling and Simulation in Materials Science journal

2020 Editor: Special Issue MDPI Energies

Professional Memberships and Affiliations:

American Physical Society (APS)

Australian Institute of Physics (AIP)

Materials Research Society (MRS)

Engineers Australia

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)

Network for Computational Nanotechnology (NCN)

Past Supervisors:

2014-2018 Lloyd C.L. Hollenberg (University of Melbourne, VIC Australia) -- Personal Web, Google Scholar

2010-2014 Eoin P. O'Reilly (Tyndall National Institute, Cork Ireland) -- Personal Web, Google-Scholar

2005-2010 Gerhard Klimeck (Purdue University, Indiana, USA) -- Personal Web, Google-Scholar