Artur Ekert

Artur Ekert ( born September 19, 1961 in Wrocław ) is a Polish- British physicist who deals with quantum computer science.

Ekert studied at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow physics and mathematics, where in 1985 he received his diploma. From 1987 he continued to study at Imperial College London and Oxford University ( at Wolfson College), where he received his doctorate in 1991. After that, he was a Research Fellow at Merton College, Oxford, from 1993 head of the quantum computer science group at the Clarendon Laboratory, and from 1998 professor of physics at Oxford (as well as a Fellow at Keble College). From 2002 he was Leigh Trapnell Professor of Quantum Physics at Cambridge University, director of the Centre for Quantum computer science and Fellow of King's College. At the same time he was professor from 2002 in Singapore. He has been a visiting scientist at the University of Innsbruck (1993, 1998) with Anton Zeilinger.

Ekert has British and Polish citizenship.

Ekert showed a new ( in principle absolutely safe ) possibility of quantum cryptography ( key distribution protocol) with quantum entanglement in his thesis. Experiments to which showed the principal feasibility, he carried out in collaboration with John Rarity and Paul Tapster from DRA (Defense Research Agency ) in Malvern. and realizations of the Ekert protocol over distances of 360 m led Anton Zeilinger with employees in 1999. From Ekert also originate fundamental work on quantum computers.

In 1995 he was awarded the Maxwell Medal of the Institute of Physics, which he is a Fellow since 2004. In 2007 he received the Hughes Medal of the Royal Society. 1993 to 2000 he was Howe Fellow of the Royal Society. In 2004 he received the EU Descartes Prize with others.