Have you ever played this game with your friend where you ask them to think of a random number between 1 and 10, and then try to guess it? You might not have got the correct answer often though as there is only a one-in-10 chance of getting it right. If, however, you played this game often enough with the same friend, you might be able to figure out…
Old idea, new purpose
The idea of generating random numbers has been around for thousands of years. You might, however, be surprised to learn that true randomness is, in fact, difficult to generate. Computers have algorithms that can produce seemingly random numbers at first but even these too tend to display certain patterns with time. Given randomness is important in computing as it forms the crux of cryptography, patterns make things vulnerable as they become predictable to an extent.
Need for speed
With more and more devices online than ever before, there is a need for faster encryption, which in turn requires generating random numbers quicker than what is now possible. Earlier this year, researchers from Nanyang Technological University, Yale University, and Trinity College Dublin came together and produced the fastest random number generator yet.
To achieve this, they came up with a generator that is laser-based. Using a tiny laser that is only a millimetre long, light is bounced between mirrors that are placed at either end of an hourglass or bow-tie shaped cavity before exiting the device. While typical lasers try to minimise fluctuations to produce steady light, this set-up increases the fluctuations. This is because the random numbers are generated by digitising the intensity of fluctuations.
Better encryption
Initial tests have shown that this can produce 250 terabytes of random bits per second, which is several orders of magnitudes faster than present devices. We might be onto something huge because incorporating this laser-based system onto a chip can help us feed random numbers directly into a computer. Encryption technologies on all devices would receive a huge boost when that happens.
Picture Credit : Google
