Simon Gay - Böcker

The study of computational processes based on the laws of quantum mechanics has led to the discovery of new algorithms, cryptographic techniques, and communication primitives. This book explores quantum computation from the perspective of the branch of theoretical computer science known as semantics, as an alternative to the more well-known studies of algorithmics, complexity theory, and information theory. It collects chapters from leading researchers in the field, discussing the theory of quantum programming languages, logics and tools for reasoning about quantum systems, and novel approaches to the foundations of quantum mechanics. This book is suitable for graduate students and researchers in quantum information and computation, as well as those in semantics, who want to learn about a new field arising from the application of semantic techniques to quantum information and computation.

This volume contains the proceedings of the fIrst workshop held by the Theory and Formal Methods Section ofthe Imperial College Department of Computing. It contains papers from almost every member of the Section, from our long-term academic visitors, and from those who have recently left us. The papers fall into four broad areas: • semantics • concurrency • logic • specification with some papers spanning a number of disciplines. The subject material varies from work on mathematical foundations to practical applications of this theory, expressing the Section's commitment to both the foundations of computer science, and the application of theory to real computing problems. In preparing the workshop and these proceedings, care was taken to ensure that there were papers overviewing a field, as well as ones whose primary aim was to present new scientifIc results. This had a dual purpose: to bring our Section members up to speed in some of the areas being worked on by the Section; and to provide the reader of the proceedings not only with a good introduction to many of the specifIc areas being investigated by the Section, but also with details of some of our latest results. All the papers presented at the workshop were revised following comments made by the workshop participants, and all were subsequently reviewed by at least two people before producing the fInal versions contained in this volume.

Behavioural type systems in programming languages support the specification and verification of properties of programs beyond the traditional use of type systems to describe data processing. A major example of such a property is correctness of communication in concurrent and distributed systems, motivated by the importance of structured communication in modern software. Behavioural Types: from Theory to Tools presents programming languages and software tools produced by members of COST Action IC1201: Behavioural Types for Reliable Large-Scale Software Systems, a European research network that was funded from October 2012 to October 2016. As a survey of the most recent developments in the application of behavioural type systems, it is a valuable reference for researchers in the field, as well as an introduction to the area for graduate students and software developers.