The Technological Innovation Liliane Bettencourt Annual Chair, created in 2006, marks the joint determination of the Collège de France and the Bettencourt Schueller Foundation to highlight the importance of the work that needs to be devoted to technological innovation.
The 20th century revolution in information science and technologyexploited only a tiny fraction of the concepts introduced by quantum mechanics. For the past two decades, a second technological revolution has been in the making, based on subtle and fragile concepts such as quantum entanglement and superposition. The ability to manipulate so-called "elementary" quantum systems is at the heart of these developments, paving the way for a wide range of applications: computers capable of outperforming today's supercomputers, communication networks secured by quantum laws, and sensors measuring gravity and magnetic fields with unprecedented precision.
