Member of Board of Directors, Brazilian Academy of Sciences

Member, IAC Board

Luiz Davidovich received his PhD in 1976 at Rochester University, in Rochester, NY, in the field of Quantum Optics, under the supervision of Professor Moysés Nussenzveig. From July 1976 to October 1977, Davidovich was Assistant Professor in the “Seminar für Theorische Physic” at "Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule", in Zurich. Eventually, Prof. Davidovich returned to Brazil to the Physics Department at Pontifical Catholic University in Rio de Janeiro, where he coordinated the graduation and post-graduation programs. In June 1994, he joined the Institute of Physics of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro as a full professor.

Prof. Davidovich has been Visitor Researcher at several institutions, like the "Laboratoire de Spectroscopie Hertzienne" of “École Normale Supérieure", in Paris; the "Max Planck Institut für Quantenoptik", in Garching; the “Centre d'Études Nucléaires de Saclay", in France; the "Center for Advanced Studies" of the University of New Mexico, in Albuquerque, NM, USA; the Institute of Theoretical Physics of the University of California, in Santa Barbara; and the "Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences” in Cambridge, England. Prof. Davidovich has been invited do give plenary lectures and courses in several conferences and national and international schools, among them: lectures at the "Les Houches Summer School" (Les Houches, 1995), at the Latin-American School of Physics (Mexico, 1998), and at the 31st International Nathiagali Summer College, Pakistan (2006); plenary talk at the Spring Meeting of the Materials Research Society, San Francisco, Califórnia (2004); plenary talk at the Symposium on the World Year of Physics, in the 16th General Meeting of the Academy of Sciences for the Develping World (TWAS), Alexandria, Egypt (2005); tutorial talk at the Quantum Electronics and Laser Science (QELS) conference, San Jose, California (2008).

Prof. Davidovich has been advisor of 14 M. Sc. and 18 Ph. D. theses and published more than 80 articles in books and international journals. He was member of the Editorial Boards of Optics Communications, Quantum and Semiclassical Optics, Physical Review A and of the Journal of the Brazilian Association for the Advancement of Science. He has been member of the Editorial Board of Journal of Physics B since January 1998. His work has been concentrated lately on quantum information, and he was the Head of the Brazilian Institute for Quantum Information from December 2001 to April 2006. His present interests include the characterization of entanglement and its dynamics, proposals for quantum computing devices, the study of the interaction of systems and the environment, as well as the measurement of quantum states.

Besides all these activities Prof. Davidovich is involved in Science and Education Policies and became a well-known advisor to the Ministries of Science and Technology and Education and its agencies. He was Secretary-General of the 4th. Brazilian National Conference on Science, Technology, and Innovation for a Sustainable Development, held in Brasilia, Brazil, in May 2010. He is also interested in international cooperation and in the role of academies in advising national governments and international organizations. He has played an active role in the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (TWAS), as chair of the Physics Prize Committee and of the Membership Physics Committee. He has also chaired, in 2010, the Optical Society of America Committee for the Herbert Walther Prize.

He was elected as foreign associate to the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America in 2006. In 2000, he was awarded the Brazilian Grand-Cross of the National Order of Scientific Merit. He won the 2001 Physics Prize of the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World. He also won, in 2010, the most important prize for science in Brazil, the Admiral Alvaro Alberto prize, awarded by the National Research Council. He is a fellow of the Optical Society of America.