The Chief Executives’ Club at Queen’s and the Royal Irish Academy were delighted to welcome Professor Antonio Acin; Group Leader, Quantum Information Theory, The Institute of Photonic Sciences, Barcelona to deliver the Annual John Bell Day Lecture on Monday 6 November 2017.

There was a full house at Riddel Hall to hear Professor Acin's lecutre, 'Quantum Information and Communication:  The Legacy of John Bell'.

After welcome remarks,  Professor Sally Wheeler, Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research and Enterprise at Queen's and Senior Vice President of the Royal Irish Academy, introduced Professor Antonio Acin. Antonio is an ICREA Research Professor at ICFO-The Institute of Photonic Sciences. He has a degree in Physics from the Universitat de Barcelona (UB) and in Telecommunication Engineering from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya.

Most of his research work is in quantum information theory. This is a scientific area that studies how information is processed and transmitted when encoded on quantum particles. Using the quantum effects, new information tasks become possible: more powerful computers, unbreakable cryptography protocols and quantum teleportation. It is a very inter-disciplinary area combining tools and concepts from mathematics, computer science, physics and engineering.