Instructional Leadership, emphasis: K-12 School Leadership (MEd)
Wires that are connected to a computer.
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  6. Nanomaterial Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs) for Fiber-Optic Communication

Nanomaterial Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs) for Fiber-Optic Communication

Description

Complex nanostructures deposited with techniques such as Glancing Angle Deposition (GLAD) inserted in a fiber-optic cable create unique patterns that can be exploited as physical unclonable functions (PUFs) through an image detector and an apparatus containing memories with ternary states. The PUFs strengthen the level of security of authentication as part of a set of cryptographic primitives by utilizing the variations created by the nanostructures. The resulting PUFs can act as a real firewall by blocking communications through the fiber-optic cable when the challenge-response pairs (CRPs) are not matching. Authentication is only granted when the rate of matching responses is statistically high enough.

Additional information

Patent number and inventor

15/344,499

Bertrand Cambou and John Gibbs.

Potential applications

This technology is designed for use with cryptographic systems and authentication methods.

Benefits and advantages

Because of the level of randomness and uniqueness, PUFs are difficult to extract and identify by hacking attacks, but easy to use for secure authentication.

Case number and licensing status

2016-016

This invention is available for licensing.