The discovery of the new mathematics and physics of quantum mechanics 100 years ago unlocked a new frontier for technological progress. It also necessitates a new way to talk about the science — it’s easier to understand the forces behind why an apple falls from a tree compared to the interaction of light and matter as small as single particles.
Institute for Quantum Computing (IQC) alum Fiona Thompson (MSc '24) is a PhD student in English within the University of Waterloo’s Faculty of Arts. Instead of staying in a research lab after receiving a Master of Science in Quantum Information from the Department of Chemistry, she decided to pursue a PhD with a focus on the rhetoric of science and best practices for communicating about emergent quantum technologies.
“I'm interested in how we can use methods from rhetorical studies, semiotics and literary analysis to better understand the relationship between experimental quantum science and language,” Thompson says. “Being in Waterloo’s quantum environment and listening to researchers talk about their areas of expertise inspired me to understand more about language and how we could help non-experts better grasp quantum concepts and also give scientists impactful language to articulate their research.”
She was recently awarded the 2026 Canada Graduate Research Scholarship (CGRS), administered by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC). The award for doctoral students is valued at $40,000 per year for three years and replaces the Vanier scholarship. She says receiving the CGRS scholarship is a life-changing opportunity that will allow her to be laser-focused on her doctoral research.
Dr. Michael MacDonald, Thompson’s PhD supervisor, says her research area is productive for the humanities and scientific disciplines and, more importantly, for science literacy more broadly.
"Fiona's interdisciplinary research on the rhetoric of science exemplifies the ways in which humanistic and scientific disciplines can enter into productive dialogue,” MacDonald says. “Her dissertation will make a significant contribution to our understanding of the important issues at stake in quantum technology and, more generally, scientific discourse and its reception by a public increasingly skeptical of the value of truth, science and reasoned argument.”
