Bounded Tamper Resilience: How to Go Beyond the Algebraic Barrier

Related key attacks (RKAs) are powerful cryptanalytic attacks where an adversary can change the secret key and observe the effect of such changes at the output. The state of the art in RKA security protects against an a-priori unbounded number of certain algebraic induced key relations, e.g., affine functions or polynomials of bounded degree. In this work, we show that it is possible to go beyond the algebraic barrier and achieve security against arbitrary key relations, by restricting the number of tampering queries the adversary is allowed to ask for. The latter restriction is necessary in case of arbitrary key relations, as otherwise a generic attack of Gennaro et al. (TCC 2004) shows how to recover the key of almost any cryptographic primitive. We describe our contributions in more detail below. (1) We show that standard ID and signature schemes constructed from a large class of \(\Sigma \)-protocols (including the Okamoto scheme, for instance) are secure even if the adversary can arbitrarily tamper with the prover’s state a bounded number of times and obtain some bounded amount of leakage. Interestingly, for the Okamoto scheme we can allow also independent tampering with the public parameters. (2) We show a bounded tamper and leakage resilient CCA-secure public key cryptosystem based on the DDH assumption. We first define a weaker CCA-like security notion that we can instantiate based on DDH, and then we give a general compiler that yields CCA security with tamper and leakage resilience. This requires a public tamper-proof common reference string. (3) Finally, we explain how to boost bounded tampering and leakage resilience [as in (1) and (2) above] to continuous tampering and leakage resilience, in the so-called floppy model where each user has a personal hardware token (containing leak- and tamper-free information) which can be used to refresh the secret key. We believe that bounded tampering is a meaningful and interesting alternative to avoid known impossibility results and can provide important insights into the security of existing standard cryptographic schemes.     

Enhanced photoluminescence from free-standing microstructures fabricated on MBE grown PbSe–PbSrSe MQW structure

Fabrication of microrods from multi-quantum well (MQW) PbSe–PbSrSe structure grown in molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) followed by its morphological as well as optical characterizations are described. Pulsed PL intensity is increased by 64 times per unit surface area from a free-standing MQW microrod mounted on copper heat sink compared with the bulk sample. Enhancement in side emission power due to the higher optical confinement effect during pulsed photoluminescence (PL) from MQW semiconductor microtube inserted in hollow quartz optical fiber signifies that these microstructures are robust in nature and crucial contenders for portable mid-infrared optoelectronic devices to be used in the field of industrial trace-gas sensing.     

Elimination of Fresnel Reflection Boundary Effects and Beam Steering in Pulsed Terahertz Computed Tomography

For the past few decades there has been tremendous innovation and development of Terahertz (THz) science and imaging. In particular, the technique of 3-D computed tomography has been adapted from the X-Ray to the THz range. However, the finite refractive index of materials in the THz range can severally refract probing THz beams during the acquisition of tomography data. Due to Fresnel reflection power losses at the boundaries as well as steering of the THz beam through the sample, refractive effects lead to anomalously high local attenuation coefficients near the material boundaries of a reconstructed image. These boundary phenomena can dominate the reconstructed THz-CT images making it difficult to distinguish structural defect(s) inside the material. In this paper an algorithm has been developed to remove the effects of refraction in THz-CT reconstructed images. The algorithm is successfully implemented on cylindrical shaped objects.     

Terahertz (THz) Frequency Sources and Antennas - A Brief Review

In this paper we review THz radiation properties, generation methods, and antenna configurations. This paper suggests some new class of antennas that can be used at THz frequency, like optical antennas or Carbon nanotube antennas. THz technology has become attractive due to the low energy content and nonionizing nature of the signal. This property makes them suitable for imaging and sensing applications. But at the same time detection and generation of THz signals has been technologically challenging. This paper presents a comparative study of the generation techniques for THz frequency signals giving emphasis to the some new techniques like Quantum Cascade lasers which has created significant research interest. The main aim for this study is to find out the materials suitable for fabricating THz devices and antennas, a suitable method for generation of high power at THz frequency and an antenna that will make THz communication possible.     

A heuristic method for design of survivable WDM networks with p-cycles

We consider a new heuristic method for design of survivable wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) networks with preconfigured protection cycles (p-cycles). Numerical studies show that the new heuristic works well for different traffic patterns, and the spare capacity obtained by the new heuristic is very close to that of the optimal solution but with much reduced computational time.     

Evaluation of the Biocompatibility of PLACL/Collagen Nanostructured Matrices with Cardiomyocytes as a Model for the Regeneration of Infarcted Myocardium

Pioneering research suggests various modes of cellular therapeutics and biomaterial strategies for myocardial tissue engineering. Despite several advantages, such as safety and improved function, the dynamic myocardial microenvironment prevents peripherally or locally administered therapeutic cells from homing and integrating of biomaterial constructs with the infarcted heart. The myocardial microenvironment is highly sensitive due to the nanoscale cues that it exerts to control bioactivities, such as cell migration, proliferation, differentiation, and angiogenesis. Nanoscale control of cardiac function has not been extensively analyzed in the field of myocardial tissue engineering. Inspired by microscopic analysis of the ventricular organization in native tissue, a scalable in‐vitro model of nanoscale poly(L ‐lactic acid)‐co ‐poly(? ‐caprolactone)/collagen biocomposite scaffold is fabricated, with nanofibers in the order of 594 ± 56 nm to mimic the native myocardial environment for freshly isolated cardiomyocytes from rabbit heart, and the specifically underlying extracellular matrix architecture: this is done to address the specificity of the underlying matrix in overcoming challenges faced by cellular therapeutics. Guided by nanoscale mechanical cues provided by the underlying random nanofibrous scaffold, the tissue constructs display anisotropic rearrangement of cells, characteristic of the native cardiac tissue. Surprisingly, cell morphology, growth, and expression of an interactive healthy cardiac cell population are exquisitely sensitive to differences in the composition of nanoscale scaffolds. It is shown that suitable cell–material interactions on the nanoscale can stipulate organization on the tissue level and yield novel insights into cell therapeutic science, while providing materials for tissue regeneration.     

Hybrid Wireless-Optical Broadband-Access Network (WOBAN): A Review of Relevant Challenges

The hybrid wireless-optical broadband-access network (WOBAN) is a promising architecture for future access networks. Recently, the wireless part of WOBAN has been gaining increasing attention, and early versions are being deployed as municipal access solutions to eliminate the wired drop to every wireless router at customer premises. This architecture saves on network deployment cost because the fiber need not penetrate each end-user, and it extends the reach of emerging optical-access solutions, such as passive optical networks. This paper first presents an architecture and a vision for the WOBAN and articulates why the combination of wireless and optical presents a compelling solution that optimizes the best of both worlds. While this discussion briefly touches upon the business drivers, the main arguments are based on technical and deployment considerations. Consequently, the rest of this paper reviews a variety of relevant research challenges, namely, network setup, network connectivity, and fault-tolerant behavior of the WOBAN. In the network setup, we review the design of a WOBAN where the back end is a wired optical network, the front end is managed by a wireless connectivity, and, in between, the tail ends of the optical part [known as optical network unit (ONU)] communicate directly with wireless base stations (known as ldquogateway routersrdquo). We outline algorithms to optimize the placement of ONUs in a WOBAN and report on a survey that we conducted on the distribution and types of wireless routers in the Wildhorse residential neighborhood of North Davis, CA. Then, we examine the WOBAN's routing properties (network connectivity), discuss the pros and cons of various routing algorithms, and summarize the idea behind fault-tolerant design of such hybrid networks.     

Testing and Diagnosis of Realistic Defects in Digital Microfluidic Biochips

Microfluidics-based biochips are soon expected to revolutionize biosensing, clinical diagnostics and drug discovery. Robust off-line and on-line test techniques are required to ensure system dependability as these biochips are deployed for safety-critical applications. Due to the underlying mixed-technology and mixed-energy domains, biochips exhibit unique failure mechanisms and defects. We first relate some realistic defects to fault models and observable errors. We next set up an experiment to evaluate the manifestations of electrode-short faults. Motivated by the experimental results, we present a testing and diagnosis methodology to detect catastrophic faults and locate faulty regions. The proposed method is evaluated using a biochip performing real-life multiplexed bioassays.     

Software-defined optical networks (SDONs): a survey

This paper gives an overview of software-defined optical networks (SDONs). It explains the general concepts on software-defined networks (SDNs), their relationship with network function virtualization, and also about OpenFlow, which is a pioneer protocol for SDNs. It then explains the benefits and challenges of extending SDNs to multilayer optical networks, including flexible grid and elastic optical networks, and how it compares to generalized multi-protocol label switching for implementing a unified control plane. An overview on the industry and research efforts on SDON standardization and implementation is given next, to bring the reader up to speed with the current state of the art in this field. Finally, the paper outlines the benefits achieved by SDONs for network operators, and also some of the important and relevant research problems that need to be addressed.     

ENROUTE: An Entropy Aware Routing Scheme for Information-Centric Networks (ICN)

With the exponential growth of end users and web data, the internet is undergoing the change of paradigm from a user-centric model to a content-centric one, popularly known as information-centric networks (ICN). Current ICN research evolves around three key-issues namely (i) content request searching, (ii) content routing, and (iii) in-network caching scheme to deliver the requested content to the end user. This would improve the user experience to obtain requested content because it lowers the download delay and provides higher throughput. Existing researches have mainly focused on on-path congestion or expected delivery time of a content to determine the optimized path towards custodian. However, it ignores the cumulative effect of the link-state parameters and the state of the cache, and consequently it leads to degrade the delay performance. In order to overcome this shortfall, we consider both the congestion of a link and the state of on-path caches to determine the best possible routes. We introduce a generic term entropy to quantify the effects of link congestion and state of on-path caches. Thereafter, we develop a novel entropy dependent algorithm namely ENROUTE for searching of content request triggered by any user, routing of this content, and caching for the delivery this requested content to the user. The entropy value of an intra-domain node indicates how many popular contents are already cached in the node, which, in turn, signifies the degree of enrichment of that node with the popular contents. On the other hand, the entropy for a link indicates how much the link is congested with the traversal of contents. In order to have reduced delay, we enhance the entropy of caches in nodes, and also use path with low entropy for downloading contents. We evaluate the performance of our proposed ENROUTE algorithm against state-of-the-art schemes for various network parameters and observe an improvement of 29–52% in delay, 12–39% in hit rate, and 4–39% in throughput.