Finding lower bounds on the complexity of secret sharing schemes by linear programming

Optimizing the maximum, or average, length of the shares in relation to the length of the secret for every given access structure is a difficult and long-standing open problem in cryptology. Most of the known lower bounds on these parameters have been obtained by implicitly or explicitly using that every secret sharing scheme defines a polymatroid related to the access structure. The best bounds that can be obtained by this combinatorial method can be determined by using linear programming, and this can be effectively done for access structures on a small number of participants. By applying this linear programming approach, we improve some of the known lower bounds for the access structures on five participants and the graph access structures on six participants for which these parameters were still undetermined. Nevertheless, the lower bounds that are obtained by this combinatorial method are not tight in general. For some access structures, they can be improved by adding to the linear program non-Shannon information inequalities as new constraints. We obtain in this way new separation results for some graph access structures on eight participants and for some ports of non-representable matroids. Finally, we prove that, for two access structures on five participants, the combinatorial lower bound cannot be attained by any linear secret sharing schemePeer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Moduli spaces of Dirac operators for finite spectral triples

The structure theory of finite real spectral triples developed by Krajewski and by Paschke and Sitarz is generalised to allow for arbitrary KO-dimension and the failure of orientability and Poincare duality, and moduli spaces of Dirac operators for such spectral triples are defined and studied. This theory is then applied to recent work by Chamseddine and Connes towards deriving the finite spectral triple of the noncommutative-geometric Standard Model.Comment: AMS-LaTeX, 60 pp. Revised version of qualifying year project (Master's thesis equivalent), BIGS, University of Bonn. V2: Final version with minor corrections, to appear in the Proceedings of the Workshop on Quantum Groups and Noncommutative Geometry, M. Marcolli and D. Parashar (eds.

Algebraic symmetries of generic (m+1)(m+1) dimensional periodic Costas arrays

In this work we present two generators for the group of symmetries of the generic $(m+1)$ dimensional periodic Costas arrays over elementary abelian $(\mathbb{Z}_p)^m$ groups: one that is defined by multiplication on $m$ dimensions and the other by shear (addition) on $m$ dimensions. Through exhaustive search we observe that these two generators characterize the group of symmetries for the examples we were able to compute. Following the results, we conjecture that these generators characterize the group of symmetries of the generic $(m+1)$ dimensional periodic Costas arrays over elementary abelian $(\mathbb{Z}_p)^m$ groups

Torsion pairs in a triangulated category generated by a spherical object

We extend Ng's characterisation of torsion pairs in the 2-Calabi-Yau triangulated category generated by a 2-spherical object to the characterisation of torsion pairs in the w-Calabi-Yau triangulated category, $T_w$, generated by a w-spherical object for any integer w. Inspired by the combinatorics of $T_w$ for w < 0, we also characterise the torsion pairs in a certain w-Calabi-Yau orbit category of the bounded derived category of the path algebra of Dynkin type A.Comment: v2: 36 pages, 11 figures, added Section 4 which deals with extensions whose outer terms are decomposable, minor changes in presentation, accepted in J. Algebr

Polynomial knot and link invariants from the virtual biquandle

The Alexander biquandle of a virtual knot or link is a module over a 2-variable Laurent polynomial ring which is an invariant of virtual knots and links. The elementary ideals of this module are then invariants of virtual isotopy which determine both the generalized Alexander polynomial (also known as the Sawollek polynomial) for virtual knots and the classical Alexander polynomial for classical knots. For a fixed monomial ordering $<$, the Gr\"obner bases for these ideals are computable, comparable invariants which fully determine the elementary ideals and which generalize and unify the classical and generalized Alexander polynomials. We provide examples to illustrate the usefulness of these invariants and propose questions for future work.Comment: 12 pages; version 3 includes corrected figure

Finite dimensional quantum group covariant differential calculus on a complex matrix algebra

Using the fact that the algebra M(3,C) of 3 x 3 complex matrices can be taken as a reduced quantum plane, we build a differential calculus Omega(S) on the quantum space S defined by the algebra C^\infty(M) \otimes M(3,C), where M is a space-time manifold. This calculus is covariant under the action and coaction of finite dimensional dual quantum groups. We study the star structures on these quantum groups and the compatible one in M(3,C). This leads to an invariant scalar product on the later space. We analyse the differential algebra Omega(M(3,C)) in terms of quantum group representations, and consider in particular the space of one-forms on S since its elements can be considered as generalized gauge fields.Comment: 11 pages, LaTeX, uses diagrams.st