Information technology to make quantum leap

The Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council has appointed Andrew Briggs, professor of materials at Oxford University, director of a research centre that could revolutionise the way information is handled.

The £9 million Quantum Information Processing Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration will explore how quantum physics can be used to manipulate, store and transmit information.

Professor Briggs has invited academic and industrial communities to help him select the research focus via the internet ( www.materials.ox.ac.uk/qipirc ).