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Professor Jose Lado was granted the Early Career Award 2023 by the Spanish Physics Society (RSEF) and the BBVA Foundation. The Early Career Theory Award is granted to a physicist, either Spanish or currently working in Spain, with 35 years or less, for outstanding contributions to theoretical physics.

From the official quotation, the prize was awarded to Jose Lado for his contributions to theoretical and computational physics of materials, particularly in the study of emerging phenomena and topological properties of quantum materials. His research on low-dimensional materials has been published in high-impact multidisciplinary journals and has inspired cutting-edge experiments. Furthermore, his development of open-source scientific software packages is highly valued and widely used by many research groups. All these accomplishments have established him as a leading figure in the field of condensed matter physics.

The research of Lado focuses on engineering quantum materials, including van der Waals heterostructures, strongly correlated materials, and developing machine learning methods for their design. Lado has created open-source software to model topological and correlated quantum materials that are used internationally both for teaching MSc and PhD students and at the research level by experimental groups.

Lado leads the Correlated Quantum Materials (CQM) group at Aalto Department of Applied Physics. The CQM group brings together the theory of van der Waals materials, emergence in quantum many-body physics, and machine learning for quantum matter to design exotic quantum materials. The CQM group also works in collaboration with experimental groups, both at Aalto and internationally, designing and engineering new quantum materials, and van der Waals quantum materials in particular.

The field of quantum materials is one of the spearheads of the Department of Applied Physics at Aalto and InstituteQ, the Finnish Quantum Institute.

‘The engineering of artificial quantum materials represents one of the most disruptive directions in physics. Quantum materials realize an interdisciplinary field bringing together physics, chemistry, material science, electrical engineering, and computer science. Creating new quantum materials will allow us to reveal radically new fundamental science and to develop new groundbreaking quantum technologies’, says Lado.

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