Francesca Vidotto
Francesca Vidotto (born November 22, 1980) is an Italian theoretical physicist.
She earned her UG/MA in theoretical physics at the University of Padova and the PhD as double-degree at the University of Pavia and the Aix-Marseille Université. Afterwards, she was a postdoc researcher at the universities of Grenoble, Nijmegen and Bilbao. She was awarded a Rubicon (2012) and a Veni (2014) fellowship by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research. She was a researcher at Laboratoire de Physique Subatomique et de Cosmologie and teaching assistant at Université J. Fourier in Grenoble, France (2011-2012).
Since 2019, she is an Assistant Professor of Physics & Astronomy and Philosophy at the University of Western Ontario, where she holds a Canada Research Chair in Foundations of Physics. She is also a core member and associate director of Western\'s Rotman Institute of Philosophy.
Her research explores the quantum aspects of the gravitational field, in the framework of Loop Quantum Gravity. Her work covers topics from the cosmological and astrophysical applications of quantum gravity to the reflections on the nature of space-time and the foundations of quantum mechanics. She is best known for two research directions: Spin foam Cosmology, and Planck stars, with special emphasis on white holes and black hole remnants. Since 2019, her main research interests have been cosmology, the quantum effect of black holes, and the foundations of quantum mechanics.
Vidotto won the first prize (shared with Amanda Gefter) in the 2023 FQXi contest \"How could science be different?\" for her essay \"How Could Science Be Different? Ask a feminist!\". She is an advocate for equity, inclusion and diversity in the physics field. She also believes philosophy and physics go hand in hand.
