Implications of Quantum Computation for the Foundations of Quantum Mechanics

Cornell University, Ithaca NY

Investigators

Abstract

0098429 Mermin The PI will re-examine old interpretational questions in the foundations of quantum mechanics in the light of new developments in quantum computation which focus on the quantum state exclusively as a way of manipulating of transmitting (digital) information. A self-contained introduction to the quantum theory will be formulated that is entirely accessible to computer scientists unacquainted with contemporary physics, as a generalization of how one defines and manipulates the ordinary bits of classical information theory.