MATH 499C Cryptology
This course will offer an overview of the history of Cryptology (both cryptography - writing in code - and cryptanalysis - code breaking) and the mathematics involved in the enterprise. Topics will include substitution and transposition ciphers, cryptanalysis of ciphers using probabilistic methods, and public-key encryption, including its number-theoretic underpinnings (prime factorization, Fermat's Little Theorem).This is a special, one-time course offering for the Winter intersession January 2-16, 2002. It applies towards the B. S. in mathematics.