Simon was born in 1988 and during his studies in physics he became thrilled by the possibilities we have when controlling particles at the atomic scale. In 2013 he joined the team of Prof. Francesca Ferlaino for his PhD studies to work on a novel type of quantum system – ultracold magnetic Erbium atoms. His work led to several groundbreaking results on few- and many-body physics, and in the area of quantum simulations. For his PhD thesis he was awarded the IQOQI dissertation prize of the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

In 2018, he switched to the field of solid-state quantum optics and quantum information, joining the group of Prof. Ronald Hanson at QuTech. He acquired his own funding from the Austrian Science Fund, which allowed him to work towards a multi-node quantum network – a cutting-edge technological advance. In 2020 he and his collegues succeeded in this challenge, reporting on the demonstration of entanglement generation between quantum network nodes that do not share a direct connection – a prime building block for a future quantum internet. Based on this work, he was awarded the Carl-Zeiss Award for Young Researchers in 2023.

In 2020, he joined the group of Prof. Tracy Northup at the University of Innsbruck to work on the vision of large scale quantum networks that one day may span across Europe or even the world. As a significant first step, the team realized entanglement generation between two trapped-ion quantum network nodes separated across the university’s campus.

In 2022, he started his first independent project, working towards the goal of coupling single spin states to the mechanical state of levitated mesoscopic diamond particles. In 2026, he was awarded an ERC Starting Grant along his vision to probe quantum mechanics at the interface to the classical world. Throughout his scientific career, he has remained curiosity-driven, and for the upcoming years, he aims to push the boundaries of our understanding of quantum mechanics – there is a long scientific journey ahead.