QUROPE Quantum Information Processing and Communication in Europe

European researchers have been from the outset prominent in setting the agenda of, and leading, the worldwide research efforts in quantum information science, in friendly competition with similar efforts and programs in the US, Australia, Canada, Japan and China. This includes pioneering work on the foundations of the quantum theory of computation, quantum algorithms, and the discovery of entangled state quantum cryptography, which generated a spate of new research that established a vigorously active new area of physics, computer science and cryptology. Many subsequent seminal contributions, inspired by the 1994 Shor’s quantum factoring algorithm, such as ways of implementing quantum computation using ion traps, quantum dots, cavity QED, optical lattices and a number of other technologies, novel computational architectures, methods of error correction and fault tolerant quantum computation originated in Europe. A unique feature and strength of European research is the broad range of activities and expertise, linking coherently efforts from experimental realization all the way to basic theoretical questions in quantum information science and quantum physics.