David Deutsch works on fundamental issues in physics, particularly the quantum theory of computation and information, and the new field of constructor theory. In 1985, he wrote a pioneering paper that proposed the idea of a universal quantum computer, and then made some of the most important advances in the field, including his discovery of the first quantum algorithms.
He is known for a number of theoretical advances, such as the theory of quantum logic gates and quantum computational networks, as well as several fundamental quantum universality results. All of this work set the agenda for subsequent international research efforts in quantum computation.
In 1998, David was awarded the Paul Dirac Prize and Medal by the Institute of Physics, and in 2005 he won the Edge of Computation Science Prize. He has published numerous articles and research papers, presented three TED talks and is the author of two popular science books on Everettian (many-universes) quantum theory, evolution, computation and knowledge creation: The Fabric of Reality (1997) and The Beginning of Infinity (2011).
