From: tcmay@got.net (Timothy C. May)
Date: Tue, 28 Nov 1995 14:07:06 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: Directed Hamiltonian Path Problem
Message-ID: <acdfe4a7010210043794@[205.199.118.202]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


At 4:04 AM 11/28/95, Thaddeus J. Beier wrote:
>>  I am curious on whether there are any applications of the directed
>> Hamiltonian path problem to cryptography, zero-knowledge proofs, etcetera. My
>> reaosn for asking is that I've come across something in my field (molecular
>> genetics) that can be used to solve such problems in a couple of weeks or so.
>>  -Allen
>>
>>
>Secret sharing can be done by Hamiltonian paths.  No public key code has been
>found to take advantage of those, or any other NP complete problem, so far as
>I know.  DNA computing really doesn't solve the Hamiltonian graph problem, it
>just makes the biggest one that you can solve a little bit bigger.  500 point
>graphs remain insoluble (pun unitended) for earth-sized vats of DNA.
>
>Really.

Thaddeus beat me to the punch, as I was going to say just about the same thing.

The work by Adleman on "vats of computers" is intriguing, but is no real
solution to the problem of exponential or superexponential growth: a
problem that Adleman's vat could solve with a fish tank full of DNA
computers in a day could be easily outpaced by a key length "only" a bit
longer.

Check the archives for many articles on this topic. Also, check the Web
search engines for conferences, papers, etc. on this.

--Tim May

Views here are not the views of my Internet Service Provider or Government.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
Corralitos, CA              | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^756839      | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders are just speed bumps on the information superhighway."