Ekin Cubuk is a physicist-turned-founder and research scientist with seven years of industry experience and a PhD in Condensed Matter and Materials Physics from Harvard. Based in Mountain View, he spent nearly eight years at Google DeepMind applying computational and machine learning techniques to scientific problems before co-founding Periodic Labs. His work bridges rigorous numerical methods and ML—contributing EAM potential implementations and Behler-Parrinello network support to the jax-md project, highlighting expertise in differentiable molecular dynamics and hardware-accelerated simulations. Ekin’s background blends postdoctoral research at Stanford with deep practical experience in production research systems, making him adept at turning complex physical models into scalable software. He brings a rare combination of academic depth, engineering discipline, and startup appetite for building applied science products.
6 years of coding experience
8 years of employment as a software developer
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Condensed Matter and Materials Physics, Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) Condensed Matter and Materials Physics at Harvard University
Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) Physics, Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) Physics at Swarthmore College
Contributions:1 review, 36 commits, 38 PRs in 2 years 5 months
Contributions summary:Ekin focused on adding and testing EAM (Embedded Atom Model) potential functionality, a core component related to molecular dynamics simulations. Their work involved implementing the EAM potential, including features like loading parameters from LAMMPS files, and incorporating dtype testing. This suggests a focus on developing and testing numerical methods for the jax-md library. The user also contributed to a Behler-Parrinello network, adding to machine learning capabilities.
Beyond the Imitation Game collaborative benchmark for enormous language models
Contributions:7 pushes, 1 branch in 28 days
benchmarkcollaborativelanguage-modelsbeyond
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