Girish S. Agarwal received his MS degree from Banaras Hindu University, India and his PhD from the University of Rochester, USA. He is currently a Distinguished University Professor at the Texas A&M University. He also holds The INFOSYS Foundation Chair at the Indian Institute of Science and held J R D TATA Chair at The Tata Institute of Fundamental Research and Einstein Professorship, Indian National Science Academy.

Agarwal is an influential physicist with magisterial works in quantum optics. A key part of his work involved studying the non-classical properties of light, and how this light interacts with atoms leading to nonclassical states like CAT states of many qubit systems. He has several firsts to his credit - development of quantum statistical framework for studying cooperative effects like superradiance; fluctuation dissipation theorems for nonequilibrium systems; quantum electrodynamics with anisotropic vacuum; surface excitation produced enhancement of QED effects; enhancement of the nonlinear optical effects and control of phase matching with control electromagnetic fields; and sample size dependence of the vacuum Rabi splittings.

He has published more than 700 papers and authored two books on quantum optics. He is a Fellow of Optica, the American Physical Society, the Indian National Science Academy, The Royal Society, and The World Academy of Sciences (TWAS). He is work has been recognized with Optica’s Max Born Award, the TWAS Award in Physics, and the Humboldt Research Award. In 2022, he received the Charles Hard Townes Medal, "for discoveries in theoretical quantum optics especially vacuum induced coherences, photon added coherent states, non-classical cat states for qubits via engineered many body interactions, and transparency in optomechanical systems."