The Cugliandolo–Kurchan equations, two integro-differential equations describing the behavior of spin glass, are named for her and her coauthor Jorge Kurchan [fr], another Argentine physicist, after their studies of these equations.[2][3]
After completing her doctorate, she was a postdoctoral researcher at the National University of La Plata, Sapienza University of Rome, and Pierre and Marie Curie University, before becoming a researcher for the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) in 1996, associated with the laboratory for theoretical physics of the École normale supérieure (Paris). She became an associate professor at the École normale supérieure in 1997, returned briefly to the CNRS in 2002, and in the same year visited Harvard University as a Guggenheim Fellow. In 2003 she became a full professor with Pierre and Marie Curie University. She was also director of the École de physique des Houches from 2007 to 2017, and worked half-time for the CNRS from 2009 to 2014. In 2018, Pierre and Marie Curie University merged with several other institutions to become Sorbonne University, where she continues as a full professor.[5]
Recognition
Cugliandolo has been a member of the Institut Universitaire de France for three terms, 2004–2009, 2014–2019, and 2019–2024.[5] She won the Prix Paul Langevin in 2002,[6] and in the same year won the Marie Curie award of the European Commission.[7] She won the Irène Joliot-Curie Prize for female scientist of the year in 2015.[8] In 2024 she was elected International Member of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA. She received the 2025 Onsager Prize of the American Physical Society jointly with J-P Bouchaud and J Kurchan.
