I work for a company that has always been committed to research and innovation as a form of economic growth. Investing in research is investing in the future.

We have recently invested a lot of money in a start-up founded by young scientists who are making important progress in the field of quantum cryptography.

Committing to technologies that are not yet mature is clearly a risk, but doing it before everyone else maximises your profits if you succeed.

I really like to go hiking, and satellite navigation systems, such as GPS and Galileo, help me not get lost.

It is amazing to be able to see my position on the map to an accuracy of just a few metres. That would be impossible if navigation systems' satellites did not have atomic clocks. The quantum nature of atoms ensures these clocks' extreme precision, which translates into a minimal margin of error on our location.

Since I live in a small mountain village with few shops, I have got used to buying everything I need online. But there are many people in the village, including my grandmother, who prefer to drive an hour to the city rather than enter their details on the internet, because they are afraid of hacker attacks.

Although this is a major danger, I am not worried. I have read that there are many people dedicated to studying new ways to improve the communications security. It seems the most promising techniques are related to the exotic properties of quantum physics!

In quantum physics, measurement means extracting information from a system in some way.

Measuring a quantum system can change its state: for example, polarisation measurements can switch the polarisation from vertical to horizontal.

Contrary to what happens in the macroscopic world, in quantum physics the order of measurements can vary the final result.

Applications: increasing the security of cryptography. The inevitable effect of measurement on a particle's state may be evidence of a spy's presence.

Quantum physics describes the world at both atomic and molecular scales: in recent years, the scientific community has learned to take advantage of phenomena that appear at microscopic scale to create new technologies.

Quantum technologies are expected to improve the way in which some physical systems are studied, communications security, computing speed and sensor sensitivity.

With more than half of its groups working in these fields, ICFO is pooling its efforts with groups from other research centres and companies, playing an active role in networks at local (Complementary Plan - Quantum Communications) and international level (European Quantum Flagship), which aim to accelerate the arrival of these technologies in society.

ICFO is home to some of the coldest places on earth, but no-one can go inside them. In these places the temperature is lower than in deep space: just a few fractions of a degree (hundredths of a nanokelvin) above absolute zero.

Only a few laboratories in the world can reproduce these extreme conditions in small vacuum chambers, where they can trap small numbers of atoms (from a few million to a single atom, depending on the experiment). In order to be able to study the interesting quantum properties that appear at such low temperatures, it is essential for the atoms to be as cold (and therefore as still) as possible.

Photo: One of the ICFO labs where atoms are cooled to close to absolute zero.

Interferometers are devices that use interference as a tool for very precise measurements.

Quantum properties allow us to further increase accuracy and measure things that are too small for classical physics.

Applications: gravitational waves, super-resolution microscopy, photolithography (printing materials with light), variations in the ground gravitational field (useful for knowing the levels of oil deposits or aquifers).

An open debate on quantum physics is how it is interpreted. The most common and oldest one (1925-1927) is the Copenhagen interpretation (which we have used in the Info Cards). However, there are other interpretations, such as the many-worlds interpretation (approx. 1960), which suggests that when we perform a measurement, all possible results appear in parallel universes, but we only observe one. One of the problems the interpretations have is that it is not clear whether they are experimentally verifiable.

Although quantum technologies are still in a very early stage, their applications in very wide range of areas are enormously promising. Thomas J. Watson, the CEO of IBM, apparently said in 1943 that "there is a market for about 5 computers" in the world.

It is possible for us, at the present moment, to judge the possible impact of new technologies?

Their applications in all fields of human activity will radically change our lives, just as electricity and electronics once did. We must invest as much as we can in their development, to make them commercially viable as soon as possible. 

We should not be fooled by illusory promises. We have gone very far with traditional technologies and we still have a long way to go: we should keep the current investment in quantum technologies at the same level. Let scientists do their work and continue to research, focusing on maintaining and improving the technologies that we already have. 

Research into quantum physics and its applications is positive, but we currently have other far more important and pressing issues, such as hunger, poverty, wars and terrorism. Let us maintain research, but invest our money to find solutions to the major problems our society has today.  

Quantum technologies are very promising, but if they are to be effective, they require solid knowledge of their foundations. We should invest in fundamental research: a better understanding of the foundations of quantum physics will naturally lead to the development of its applications.