The aim of this book is twofold: to provide a comprehensive account of the foundations of the theory and to outline a theoretical and philosophical interpretation suggested from the results of the last twenty years." "There is a need to provide an account of the foundations of the theory because recent experience has largely confirmed the theory and offered a wealth of new discoveries and possibilities. On the other side, the following results have generated a new basis for discussing the problem of the interpretation: the new developments in measurement theory; the experimental generation of "Schrodinger cats"; recent developments which allow, for the first time, the simultaneous measurement of complementary observables; quantum information processing, teleportation and computation." "To accomplish this task, the book combines historical, systematic and thematic approaches.