MITRE Appoints Gerald Gilbert a MITRE Fellow

McLean, Va., and Bedford, Mass., January 7, 2021—MITRE named Gerald Gilbert, Ph.D., a MITRE Fellow to expand MITRE’s quantum science initiatives. MITRE Fellows are a select group of preeminent scientists in their fields who lead critically important programs. The MITRE Fellows program has a history of deeply impactful work to the nation and world, including the Global Positioning System (GPS) and adaptive signal processing.

A 24-year MITRE veteran, Gilbert is the founder of quantum science research at MITRE and principal investigator of MITRE’s Quantum Moonshot program. A partnership of leading physics research groups at MITRE, MIT, and Sandia National Labs, the project aims to build the world’s first fully universal scalable quantum computer and integrated quantum network. The project is designing and building programmable nano-photonic quantum processors that will be the engines of a scalable universal quantum computer.

“Gerry’s contributions to MITRE and his field run deep—few people in the world have dedicated their lives to this level of expertise and innovation,” said Charles Clancy, chief futurist, senior vice president, and general manager, MITRE Labs. “As a MITRE Fellow, Gerry will continue to push the boundaries of what’s possible, which is mission critical in the race for global competitiveness in quantum science.”

Our fellows are given a mandate and resources to develop and lead high-risk scientific or technical initiatives to address national- or global-scale problems. They also serve as subject matter experts and advisors to mission-critical programs, officers, and our board of trustees. They drive innovation in science and technology, accelerate solutions for the nation’s biggest challenges, and deliver on MITRE’s pioneering vision.

Gilbert is a member of the IEEE Standards Board for Quantum Technology and has served on the U.S. Defense Science Board and the U.S. Air Force Scientific Advisory Board as an expert on quantum information science. He is co-inventor on five patents in quantum information science and has written or co-authored scientific publications spanning the fields of quantum information science, the theoretical physics of elementary particles, string theory, and radar propagation.

Gilbert earned his doctorate in theoretical physics from the University of Texas under Nobel Laureate Steven Weinberg. Afterward, he held academic research positions at the California Institute of Technology as Weingart Prize Research Fellow in Theoretical Physics, at Cambridge University under Professor Stephen Hawking, and at the University of Maryland at College Park. Gilbert has been at MITRE since 1996.

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