Note

Prospective Students

A necessary condition to work with me is that you should posses at least 2 out of the following 3:

1. Strong foundations in Mathematics,
2. Good understanding of Theoretical Computer Science,
3. Extremely good programming skills.

It is better (but not necessary) if you have taken at least one course with me.

I consider only Bachelor’s, Master’s or PhD thesis supervision. I will not reply to requests for 3-4 month internships/ RA’ship etc. The BTech/MTech thesis work will require the student to study a few papers published in one of the top conferences in the area of Cryptology, understand the design or the attack being described, and either implement or analyze the technique deeply. The papers may require knowledge of one or more of the following topics: abstract algebra, linear algebra, discrete mathematics, number theory, algorithms, theory of computation etc. Some tools/coding skills may come in handy if your work involves programming. Some of these skills are ability to use SAT solvers, FPGA implementation, Android programming, ability to use a Maths package such as Mathematica, PARI, etc.

Using Latex for writing the report is necessary.

I have realized that it is unproductive to supervise those students who are not motivated enough to work in the area. Please consider working with me only if you are willing to spend a significant amount of time on the thesis work, and work regularly on the topic. I would expect you to update me on the progress of your work each week (either in a meeting, or on email if we can’t find a meeting time). I will suggest you some work each week and you will need to discuss with me the progress on a regular basis.

If you are still reading this note, and are still interested in working with me, please meet me in my office. Please fix a mutually convenient appointment on email.