Prof. Karen Hallberg holds a PhD in Physics from the Balseiro Institute in Bariloche. She is Principal Researcher of the Argentine Council for Science and Technology (CONICET) working at the Bariloche Atomic Center and is Professor of Physics at the Balseiro Institute (Argentine Commission for Atomic Energy, CNEA, and University of Cuyo).
She is currently the Secretary General elect of the Pugwash Conferences for Science and World Affairs (1995 Peace Nobel Prize), Board Member and International Councilor of the American Physical Society, member of the WEF Global Future Council on the Future of Quantum Economy, member of the Argentine Committee for Ethics in Science and Technology, corresponding member of the Argentine Academy for Exact, Physical and Natural Sciences, member of the Latin American Academy of Sciences and Senior Associate of the ICTP (International Center for Theoretical Physics, Trieste) and member of the Editorial Board of Physical Review Research.
She served as the Head of the Condensed Matter Department at the Bariloche Atomic Center, CNEA, Argentina, as the Argentine representative to the Latin American Center of Physics (CLAF), as member of the Board of Directors of the Aspen Science Center, and on several other national and international committees.
She was awarded several prizes and recognitions such as the 2019 L'Oreal-UNESCO International Award For Women in Science (for Latin America), honorary doctorates at the National University of Jujuy and at the University Siglo XXI, Honorary Fellowship of the IAEA Marie Sklodowska Curie Fellowship, the 2005 Guggenheim Fellowship and was an Aspen Ideas Festival Scholar and several honorary mentions awarded by the Argentine Congress (upper and lower chambers).
Her research topics include the development of state-of-the-art computational approaches to understand the physics of quantum matter and nanoscopic systems. She is actively committed to reducing the gender and social gap in science and to increasing awareness of ethical considerations in science.