ITHACA, N.Y. -- Charles H. Bennett, a quantum computing expert and research fellow at the IBM T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., will deliver the first in a series of lectures sponsored by the Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science.

The lecture, "Quantum Information Processing," will be held Thursday, April 21, at 4 p.m. in 700 Clark Hall and free and open to the public.

"When classical notions of information are generalized to obey the superposition principle of quantum physics, a simpler and grander theory of computation and communication emerges, extending the old theory somewhat as the complex numbers extend the real," explains Bennett. "Within this larger theory, classical information plays its usual robust role, while quantum information, in its fragility and privacy, may be compared to the information in a dream. In the lecture, I will sketch the outlines of the enlarged theory, especially the pervasive role of entanglement in a variety of communications tasks that have no direct classical analog."

Bennett also will lead an informal seminar Wednesday, April 20, at 2:30 p.m. in 225 ILR Conference Center. His topic is "Assisted Capacities of Quantum Channels and the Reverse Shannon Theorem."

Since his arrival at IBM in 1972, Bennett has worked on the thermodynamics of computation. With colleagues, he developed a practical system of quantum cryptography, discovered "quantum teleportation" and helped found the quantitative theory of entanglement. His work has helped shape the larger field of quantum information and computation theory. Bennett is an IBM fellow, a fellow of the American Physical Society and a member of the National Academy of Sciences.

The Kavli Institute at Cornell is a "think tank" charged with exploring the major challenges and opportunities for the science of very small structures; it brings together the world's seminal thinkers and helps define the path for progress in creating significant new science. The Kavli Institute at Cornell was founded in 2004 with a gift from Fred Kavli and the Kavli Foundation of Oxnard, Calif.

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• Kavli Institute at Cornell for Nanoscale Science: http://www.research.cornell.edu/KIC/