Nicolaas Govert de Bruijn, the enchanter of friable integers

N.G. de Bruijn carried out fundamental work on integers having only small prime factors and the Dickman-de Bruijn function that arises on computing the density of those integers. In this he used his earlier work on linear functionals and differential-difference equations. We review the relevant work and also some later improvements by others.Comment: 34 pages, 1 Figur

Levels of Distribution and the Affine Sieve

This article is an expanded version of the author's lecture in the Basic Notions Seminar at Harvard, September 2013. Our goal is a brief and introductory exposition of aspects of two topics in sieve theory which have received attention recently: (1) the spectacular work of Yitang Zhang, under the title "Level of Distribution," and (2) the so-called "Affine Sieve," introduced by Bourgain-Gamburd-Sarnak.Comment: 34 pages, 2 figure

Discrete logarithms in curves over finite fields

A survey on algorithms for computing discrete logarithms in Jacobians of curves over finite fields