Bennett helped establish quantum information as a discipline, co-developing quantum key distribution and the teleportation protocol that turns shared entanglement into a communication resource.
IBM ResearchPhysical Review Letters / American Physical SocietyBennett’s work recast information as something governed by physical law. The BB84 protocol with Gilles Brassard made quantum states part of a cryptographic procedure, while the teleportation paper with five collaborators showed how entanglement and classical communication can transfer an unknown quantum state. These are defining building blocks for quantum communication and information processing. His inclusion recognizes their conceptual and technical reach, while preserving the conditions that make them meaningful: teleportation needs classical information, and a cryptographic protocol’s security must be assessed together with its assumptions and implementation.
IBM ResearchPhysical Review Letters / American Physical SocietyDefining contributions
Work, in context- 1984
Co-developing BB84
With Gilles Brassard, Bennett introduced the quantum key-distribution protocol known as BB84. It uses the behavior of quantum states to support the establishment of a shared secret key; it is a protocol contribution, not a blanket security guarantee for every device that implements it.
BB84 was jointly developed by Charles H. Bennett and Gilles Brassard.
Source-supported recordIBM Research - 1993
Quantum teleportation
Bennett, Brassard and four coauthors proposed transferring an unknown quantum state using shared entanglement, a measurement and classical communication. The protocol established a reusable quantum-information primitive and does not permit faster-than-light signaling or the copying of an arbitrary unknown state.
Coauthored protocol by Charles H. Bennett, Gilles Brassard, Claude Crépeau, Richard Jozsa, Asher Peres and William K. Wootters.
Source-supported recordPhysical Review Letters / American Physical Society
Follow the evidence
2 sourcesPrimary papers, institutional records and attributed announcements. Each source supports the claims linked above.
- IBM ResearchInstitutional profile
Charles H. Bennett
IBM Fellow, Yorktown Heights affiliation, BB84 with Brassard in 1984 and teleportation in 1993.
Checked 2026-09-19 - Physical Review Letters / American Physical SocietyResearch paper
Teleporting an unknown quantum state via dual classical and Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen channels
Bennett and coauthor attribution; entanglement plus classical communication protocol.
Published 1993 · Checked 2026-09-19