Quantum Physics: A First Encounter: Interference, Entanglement, and Reality - Softcover

Valerio Scarani has done the teachers and lecturers of the world a huge favour in giving their students the chance to appreciate the wonders of quantum mechanics and to think deeply about the meaning of each postulate, each explanation and each experiment. His book is thought-provoking and skilfully planned and one I would heartily recommend. (K. P. Zetie, Contemporary Physics)

Quantum physics is often perceived as a weird and abstract theory, which physicists must use in order to make correct predictions. But many recent experiments have shown that the weirdness of the theory simply mirrors the weirdness of phenomena: it is Nature itself, and not only our description of it, that behaves in an astonishing way. This book selects those, among these typical quantum phenomena, whose rigorous description requires neither the formalism, nor an important background in physics.

The first part of the book deals with the phenomenon of single-particle interference, covering the historical questions of wave-particle duality, objective randomness and the boundary between the quantum and the classical world, but also the recent idea of quantum cryptography. The second part introduces the modern theme of entanglement, by presenting two-particle interference phenomena and discussing Bell's inequalities. A concise review of the main interpretations of quantum physics is provided.