Marco Polini

About

I work on what electrons do when they act together, and on turning that physics into quantum hardware.

Marco Polini, portrait
Photo: Emanuele Camerini for BNKR

I am a theoretical physicist. For more than twenty years I have studied electrons in solids not one at a time, but as a collective: a liquid that can flow, swirl and oscillate in ways no single particle can. Some of that work, done with experimental colleagues in Manchester and Barcelona, showed that electrons in graphene can flow like honey, with whirlpools and all.

Today I split my time between the University of Pisa, where I hold the chair of Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics, and Planckian, the company I co-founded to build superconducting quantum processors that scale by design.

More than 240 papers and 38,000 citations, h-index 80 (Google Scholar, November 2026).

Path

  1. 2023–Co-founder and Chief Scientific OfficerPlanckian, Pisa
  2. 2019–Full Professor of Theoretical Condensed Matter PhysicsUniversity of Pisa
  3. 2017–2022Full ProfessorSchool of Physics and Astronomy, University of Manchester
  4. 2015–2019Senior Scientist, leader of the Theory and Technology of 2D Materials groupIstituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Genoa
  5. 2003–2015Researcher, tenure-track at 26 and tenured in 2008NEST, Scuola Normale Superiore and CNR, Pisa
  6. 2003Postdoctoral fellow in the group of Allan H. MacDonaldUniversity of Texas at Austin
  7. 2003Ph.D. in Physics, cum laude, with Mario P. TosiScuola Normale Superiore, Pisa

Recognition

“For contributions to the theory of interacting electrons in solids, including the theory of electron hydrodynamics in graphene.”
Citation for election as Fellow of the American Physical Society, Division of Condensed Matter Physics, 2023
  • 2020–2023Highly Cited Researcher, Clarivate Web of Science, four years running
  • ERCPanel member for ERC Starting Grants and reviewer for Starting, Consolidator and Advanced Grants
  • 2013–2021Editor of 2D Materials (IOP), and of Europhysics Letters from 2014 to 2019
  • 2010FIRB “Futuro in Ricerca” grant from the Italian Ministry of Research

Talks

A selection of recent invited talks and colloquia.

  • 2025Altering electrical transport in 2D materials through sub-wavelength cavitiesDepartment of Physics, Harvard University, and University of Cambridge
  • 2025Quantum batteries and globally driven quantum computationTechnology Innovation Institute, Abu Dhabi
  • 2024Quantum effects in energy storagePhysics Colloquium, Columbia University
  • 2024A globally driven, energy-efficient superconducting quantum computing architectureIQT Nordics, Helsinki
  • 2022Amperean superconductivity and deep subwavelength cavities: a bad marriageCavity Control of Quantum Matter, Collège de France, Paris
  • 2022Optical and plasmonic properties of twisted bilayer grapheneGordon Research Conference on Two-Dimensional Electronics
  • 2021Photon condensation in 2D materialsChez Pierre seminar, MIT
  • 2016Hydrodynamic transport, laminar flow and the AdS/CFT viscosity bound in graphenePlenary, New Frontiers in Theoretical Physics, Galileo Galilei Institute, Florence

To invite me for a talk, a lecture or an interview, use the contact form.