Chris Osborn is a physicist-turned-software leader with a decade of experience building quantum software, cloud platforms, and startups from San Francisco. He led engineering teams at Rigetti to deliver core parts of Quantum Cloud Services and contributed key functionality and testing to pyQuil, the widely used Python SDK for quantum programming. As a co-founder of Enombic and earlier founder/CEO of Cache Finance, he combines product instincts and machine learning problem framing with hands-on full-stack implementation. His background includes PhD-level experimental physics work on ultracold strontium and published research, which informs a rigorous, measurement-driven approach to engineering. Known for moving fluidly between low-level scientific experimentation and production-quality software, he’s currently on an indefinite software sabbatical while exploring new technical directions.
10 years of coding experience
6 years of employment as a software developer
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Physics, Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Physics at Columbia University in the City of New York
Bachelor of Science (B.S.), Physics, Magna Cum Laude, Bachelor of Science (B.S.), Physics, Magna Cum Laude at University of Rochester
A Python library for quantum programming using Quil.
Role in this project:
Back-end Developer
Contributions:17 commits, 28 PRs, 65 pushes in 1 year 2 months
Contributions summary:Chris made significant contributions to the `pyquil` library, primarily focused on improving the core functionality and testing of quantum programming features. Their work included implementing the `exponentiate_pauli_sum` function and related tests, enhancing documentation, and refactoring code for clarity. Furthermore, the user addressed issues related to device specifications and the QVM connection, adding features to store ISA and NoiseModel information. This includes incorporating specifications and applying noise models in the QVM to the running program.
Contributions:10 reviews, 408 commits, 26 PRs in 8 months
Find and Hire Top DevelopersWe’ve analyzed the programming source code of over 60 million software developers on GitHub and scored them by 50,000 skills. Sign-up on Prog,AI to search for software developers.