An independent editorial selection
QubitWire 100 is an annual editorial selection recognizing 100 people for their contributions to quantum computing. Each selection is supported by a specific account of their work and why it matters: foundational ideas, algorithms, error correction, hardware, software, engineering and institutions. The selection includes both active contributors and enduring historical contributions. A historical role is identified as historical.
This is a curated reference, not an objective census of the hundred most valuable people. An omission is not a judgment about a person's ability, scientific merit or importance. We look for distinct, explainable contributions across approaches to quantum computing.
A wider directory without changing the 100
The QubitWire 100 is a dated edition with exactly 100 members. It is not silently expanded when further people are verified. Instead, the Wider People Directory holds a separate, unranked set of source-linked profiles. A record there is not membership in the QubitWire 100 and does not imply a score, replacement decision or future selection.
The first wider-directory release contains 10 profiles. Each was checked against a current institutional record and at least one original research paper. The batch is deliberately small: candidates remain unpublished until their identity, role, attribution and defining claims meet the same evidence standard.
Recognize the work.
A clear editorial case begins with an attributable contribution. A senior title, funding announcement or large following is not sufficient on its own. These five questions guide future editions; they are not a numerical score or a claim that a new rubric was applied retrospectively to the 2026 cohort.
What did the person contribute?
Identify a specific discovery, method, system, tool or institutional achievement.
What was their role?
Establish individual responsibility while crediting coauthors, collaborators and teams. Organizational leadership does not imply personal invention of a company’s technology.
Why does the work matter?
Explain its significance through documented use, research, technical consequences or institutional outcomes.
Why recognize the contribution in this edition?
Identify recent progress or explain the continuing importance of foundational work. A contribution need not have originated in the preceding twelve months.
Can the case be substantiated?
Use evidence for the contribution itself, not just an identity page or a job title.
Start with the claim. Follow the source.
Resolve the identity
Confirm the professional identity and check names, aliases and affiliations. People with similar names remain separate records.
Identify the contribution
Use original papers, institutional biographies, awards and project or company records. Credit coauthored and team work as such. A company's report remains an attributed report, not independent replication.
Check the professional identification
Review the role or a narrower supported professional description within seven days of publication. Founder status, former leadership and current authority are different facts.
Write the case for inclusion
Connect specific contributions to their significance in original editorial prose. Each profile links defining claims and professional identification to the supporting source.
Keep dates and limitations visible
A paper date, an achievement date and the date a source was checked are different. Undated work is labeled without an invented year. Company plans are not completed results.
Research and implementation in this edition were assisted by AI, with source review and a separate implementation review. These are not independent human peer review or experimental validation. QubitWire is responsible for the published selection and correction process.
Alphabetical means alphabetical.
The directory defaults to reviewed family-name sort keys. Search and filters preserve surname order unless you explicitly choose Best match for search. That optional mode orders matches by relevance to the words you entered, never by influence, importance or source count. We preserve diacritics in names and normalize accents and apostrophes for matching.
Name particles are checked individually. Ronald de Wolf appears under W, consistent with his stated surname-ordering preference. Niccolo de Masi appears under D. David DiVincenzo appears under D and Lieven Vandersypen under V. Michelle Simmons and Stephanie Simmons have separate identities and profiles.
Related people are connected by explicitly shared contribution areas. These suggestions use surname order. Documented coauthorship or other working connections are labeled separately and linked to their evidence. A topic connection does not imply friendship, collaboration, endorsement or coauthorship.
A finished edition without scores
The selection recognizes different kinds of contribution without assigning a numbered rank or an artificial score out of 100. Profiles are presented alphabetically. Search relevance is a browsing aid and does not measure a person’s importance.
The historical scoring discussion is retained in the edition notes. No scoring system or future scored edition is promised.
The evidence extends to photography
Portraits are used only with documented reuse terms and credits. An image on an official website is not automatically free to reuse. An initials panel gives the same space and visibility to a person whose photograph is unavailable or not cleared.
Photo source, creator, license and any modifications are recorded on the relevant profile. These photographs remain under their stated licenses, as an exception to general site copyright terms. Any copyrightable QubitWire adaptation of a CC BY-SA 4.0 photograph is also licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0; this does not change the license of the surrounding independent text or code. Inclusion of a photograph does not imply that the subject supplied, approved or endorsed this page. Contextual images must identify the actual scene rather than suggest a person's ownership or workplace without evidence.
Portraits on the 2026 cover
The four portraits are entry points into different areas of the selection. Their placement does not confer a higher rank or imply participation or endorsement. The images are cropped to their display frames.
- Dorit Aharonov: Gershon Weiserfirer (גרשון וייסנפירר). Original photograph. CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped to fit the display frame. Any copyrightable QubitWire adaptation is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Scott Aaronson: Easy n; retouching by Dcoetzee. Original photograph. Public domain (author dedication). Cropped to fit the display frame.
- Alain Aspect: Alain Herzog / EPFL. Original photograph. CC BY-SA 4.0. Cropped to fit the display frame. Any copyrightable QubitWire adaptation is licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
- Michelle Y. Simmons: AustraliaUnlimited. Original photograph. CC BY 3.0. Cropped to fit the display frame. Source is a cropped video still.
A working route to correction
Use “Suggest a correction” on a profile to send the page and subject into the existing QubitWire contact flow. Include the exact statement or image, your proposed correction and a supporting source. Please avoid unnecessary personal information.
The contact form saves submissions privately. Its displayed receipt reports the actual delivery state. You can also email gotqubits@gmail.com. No response-time guarantee is offered.
Selection year and biography checks are separate records. A corrected employer, role or source does not silently create or remove a selection. The permanent 2026 record retains the roster and recognition statements. Material changes to that record require a dated correction note; rights and privacy corrections still apply.
Material corrections should update the affected claims and review dates. Rights or privacy removals must also be applied to controlled images, caches and public representations. Recommended maintenance is a monthly role/source review, prompt checks after known leadership changes and review of any license expiry. This recommendation is not a claim that an automatic review schedule is running.
Contact the editorial deskA useful map with visible limits
Availability of primary sources affects coverage. English-language and highly visible institutions are easier to verify, and the cohort is not a balanced sample of nationalities, demographics or every kind of quantum work. Work-base labels describe documented professional locations, not citizenship or ethnicity.
Selection and the recognition package are free. Sponsorship, advertising and commercial relationships do not determine inclusion or purchase a different profile treatment. No selection committee, adviser participation or independent peer review is claimed where it has not occurred.
No inclusion is a paid placement, investment recommendation, employment relationship or personal endorsement. Technical results have limits: physical qubits are not logical qubits, a prototype is not a fault-tolerant computer and a benchmark does not establish general advantage.
Profiles summarize selected work rather than an exhaustive bibliography. Titles and organizational affiliations can change after the check date. Evidence links can move or become inaccessible; a retrieval failure by itself does not establish that a claim is false.
Build the next edition on evidence
Future editions will use a separate dated roster. Repeat selection is possible but requires a renewed editorial case; it is not automatic membership. Selection principles and the formal review window should be published before the next edition is announced.
A formal 2027 review window has not yet been announced. You can suggest a contribution with supporting sources now for consideration in a future edition or the wider directory. There is no public voting, referral contest, fee or guarantee of inclusion. The existing 2026 roster is unchanged.
2026 edition notes
The inaugural selection is dated September 19, 2026. On September 23, 2026, QubitWire added concise recognition statements drawn from the existing source-linked accounts, a permanent edition record and free sharing assets. The same 100 people, alphabetical ordering and original biography/source check dates were preserved. This presentation update is not a new selection or a new factual verification date.
How the inaugural cohort was assembled
The supplied cohorts and challenger intake contained 138 distinct named candidates. Individual profile verification covers the final 100. For the first edition, we reconciled two overlapping draft cohorts and reviewed six named challengers. We replaced six draft selections with Lov Grover, David DiVincenzo, Daniel Loss, David Wineland, John Clarke and Chao-Yang Lu to strengthen coverage of search algorithms, spin qubits, trapped ions, superconducting foundations and photonic computation. This is a new editorial cohort, not a claim that an earlier roster was already approved.
Original scoring context
This edition publishes no QubitWire Influence Index (QWI), numbered rank, leaderboard or score-driven placement. The supplied research did not contain a complete reproducible scoring dataset. Missing evidence is not zero and an aggregate number cannot reconstruct missing components.
Any future scored edition would need a separately documented rubric, complete evidence, attribution rules, missing-data policy and reproducible calculation. QWI would remain separate from company QRank and would never determine this directory's order. No future scoring or launch date is promised.