Meet the team
The development of Quantum Game v2.0 is already in full swing, and we’d like for you to meet our team — Philippe Cochin, Chiara Decaroli (who kindly drew the illustrations you’ll see), Klem Jankiewicz, Ivana Kurecic, and Piotr Migdał.
Philippe Cochin is our lead programmer — he attended Ecole Boulle to study jewelry design, studied philosophy, was once a boxing and chess champion (sadly not a chess boxing champion), co-founded an NGO that builds hospitals, and participated in dozens of humanitarian missions in Southeast Asia. In his free time Philippe watches birds, studies quantum physics, sails, and free dives.
He began his programming career young, getting in trouble for hacking at age 13. This crucial event only propelled him further on his quest to become a law-abiding citizen and master programmer, working on a plethora of high-profile projects since. Philippe joined this project because he wanted to combine nerdery with creativity (he quotes the Decodoku quantum error correction game developed by James Wootton as his first taste of quantum physics). He enjoys disproving his own philosophical stances by studying quantum physics and he expects Quantum Game v2.0 to bridge his gap in understanding between axiomatic logic and the real world.
Chiara Decaroli is an Italian doctoral student stationed in Zürich, Switzerland — and our part-time physics–to–visuals translator. Her path from reading up on philosophy to studying experimental physics at the University of Edinburgh was sparked by a love for asking questions about the world. On her quest to become a globetrotting scientist, she completed her masters degree in photonics and quantum optics on a world tour through Barcelona, Marseille, Karlsruhe, and Zürich.
She is currently part of the Trapped Ion quantum information research group led by Jonathan Home of the ETH Zürich, where she designs, fabricates, and tests ion traps that may one day aid the creation of scalable quantum computers. During the off-hours that aren’t spent on her yoga teacher training, Chiara participates in outreach events, runs the Art&Science Collaborative — Zürich, illustrates scientific concepts, and tends to her balcony garden of over 50 plants!
Klem Jankiewicz is our lead graphics and user experience (UX) designer, who specializes in topics on the intersection of education, technology, and design. She believes that no important concept should be out of reach just because we don’t believe we can grasp it, and works to prove it by creating interactive projects that merge art and technology. Before checking out London’s graphics design scene, Klem studied programming and electronics for design, and is now focusing on showing that quantum physics isn’t black magic — it can be for everyone.
Before landing on education and technology, Klem trained as a product designer, produced exhibition, led workshops, and once ran a pop-up store selling profesionally branded and packed computer viruses. You can also see her work on big display if you pass by the façade of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw, which she designed. Even in her free time, Klem enjoys mashing together art and technology — by organizing educational projects and joining her daughter’s LEGO sessions.
Ivana Kurecic wears the hat of chief blogger for Quantum Game v2.0, but can often be found working on a doctorate in quantum information, running meetups, and raving about fountain pen inks. Her eclectic resume spans from astronomy outreach to technical documentation, and she expects game-development blogging to give her some sort of a bingo.
In her younger years, Ivana conducted, mingled with the International Association of Physics Students and organized an international conference or two, but now engages her power fantasies by studying political science and bridging its gap to quantum physics. She breeds colorful beetles, tracks her data, and would like to receive all your glittery stickers, please (but will take cat memes, too).
Once upon a time, Piotr Migdał used to be a quantum physicist (with a PhD from Barcelona’s ICFO), but now he spends his working hours as a deep learning consultant. As is the case with every freelancer, business and pleasure for Piotr tend to overlap, so he finds himself writing a professional blog, running unconferences, managing data science working groups, teaching advanced high school students — and leading the Quantum Game v2.0 development project.
When Jan Marucha, Piotr’s student at a Polish Scientific Summer School, heard about the game, he spread the word until it reached Artur Ekert, the founding Director of the Center for Quantum Technologies, where the second rendition of the game is now in full swing. It was Piotr’s love for bottom-up events and prolific side-projects that caused him to transform his chronic interest in data visualization into the original version of the Quantum Game with Photons. He also enjoys photography, mountain hiking, and he’s recently taken up balfolk dancing to get his mind in touch with his body.
We’ve been busy creating the coolest game in the known multiverse and we’d love your support. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for live glimpses into the daily life of our little game-dev team!
You can also sign up for our “the-game-has-arrived” newsletter, which we will use to let you know when it’s time to become a master of quantum physics: and new.quantumgame.io 😁
