Dr Laura Manenti joins the Sydney Quantum Academy Experts network

The Sydney Quantum Academy (SQA) is pleased to welcome Dr Laura Manenti to the SQA Experts network.

Born and raised in Milan, Dr Manenti is a Lecturer in Physics at the University of Sydney, specialising in experimental particle physics and quantum technologies. Her research explores the intersection of quantum technology and particle physics, with a particular focus on radiation effects in superconducting qubits.

Dr Manenti completed her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees at the Università degli Studi di Milano before earning her PhD from University College London (UCL). She remained at UCL as a postdoctoral researcher from 2016 to 2018, spending much of that time at CERN working on liquid argon detectors for neutrino physics.

From 2018 to 2024, Dr Manenti was a researcher at New York University Abu Dhabi, where her work spanned dark matter detectors, CubeSats, synchrotron light measurements and quantum sensors for single-photon detection.

She joined the University of Sydney in 2024 and was recently awarded an ARC Discovery Project in collaboration with Rigetti Computing.

Beyond her research, Dr Manenti is passionate about making science accessible to everyone. She is the co-author of The Littlest Girl Goes Inside an Atom, a children’s book that introduces young readers to the world of particle physics. She has also contributed to public science initiatives such as the Dark Matter Road Trip, sharing her passion for science with audiences of all ages.