Abstract: Spins are the natural carriers of quantum information given their long coherence times and the mature methods for controlling them with coherent rf. Spins in atomic gases are of particular interest given their further isolation from a thermal condensed matter environment and our ability to manipulate them optically. Laser cooling and trapping, optical pumping, coherent Raman interactions, and polarization spectroscopy are all tools in the arsenal that can be put to work. In this talk I will review a series of developments in quantum control and measurement of spins in laser-cooled atomic samples, with an eye towards quantum information processing. In collaboration with Poul Jessen, College of Optical Science, University of Arizona, we have designed and implemented tools for arbitrary state preparation in a large-dimensional hyperfine manifold, and quantum-state reconstruction in a single shot based on continuous weak measurement. We have extended this control to the design of arbitrary unitary maps, which will allow qudit logic on large spins. Finally, the coherent interaction between spins is essential for scalable quantum information processing. I will show how one perform quantum logic gates between nuclear spins over tens of nanometers based on optical Feshbach resonances in alkaline-earth-like atoms.