Quantum Computation and Quantum Information is a textbook about quantum information science written by Michael Nielsen and Isaac Chuang, regarded as a standard text on the subject.[1] It is informally known as "Mike and Ike", after the candies of that name.[2] The book assumes minimal prior experience with quantum mechanics and with computer science, aiming instead to be a self-contained introduction to the relevant features of both. (Lov Grover recalls a postdoc disparaging it with the remark, "The book is too elementary – it starts off with the assumption that the reader does not even know quantum mechanics."[3]) The focus of the text is on theory, rather than the experimental implementations of quantum computers, which are discussed more briefly.[4]
Author | Michael Nielsen and Isaac Chuang |
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Subject | Quantum information science |
Publisher | Cambridge University Press |
Publication date | 2000 (first ed.) 2010 (second ed.) |
ISBN | 978-1-107-00217-3 |
OCLC | 844974180 |
As of January 2020[update], the book has been cited over 39,000 times on Google Scholar.[5] In 2019, Nielsen adapted parts of the book for his Quantum Country project.[6]
Peter Shor called the text "an excellent book". Lov Grover called it "the bible of the quantum information field". Scott Aaronson said about it, "'Mike and Ike' as it's affectionately called, remains the quantum computing textbook to which all others are compared."[7] David DiVincenzo said, "More than any of the previous attempts, this book has identified the essential foundations of quantum information theory with a clarity that has even, in a few cases, permitted the authors to obtain some original results and point toward new research directions."[8] A review in the November 2001 edition of Foundations of Physics says, "Among the handful of books that have been written on this new subject, the present volume is the most complete and comprehensive."[9]