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Reconfigurable Optical Physical Unclonable Functions Enabled by VO2 Nanocrystal Films
Zaixin Gan1, Feiliang Chen2,3, Qian Li4
1College of Materials Science and Engineering, Sichuan University, Chengdu 610065 China.
ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces
|January 19, 2022
Summary
This study introduces a reconfigurable optical physical unclonable function (R-PUF) using VO2 nanocrystals. The R-PUF offers adjustable challenge-response behaviors, enhancing hardware security for authentication and encryption.
Area of Science:
- Materials Science
- Optics
- Computer Science
Background:
- Optical physical unclonable functions (PUFs) are vital for hardware security, resisting machine learning attacks.
- Traditional optical PUFs have fixed challenge-response behaviors due to deterministic structures.
Purpose of the Study:
- To propose and demonstrate a reconfigurable PUF (R-PUF) with adjustable optical responses.
- To enhance the security and encoding capacity of optical PUFs.
Main Methods:
- Utilized the reversible phase transition of Vanadium Dioxide (VO2) nanocrystals.
- Combined VO2 with Titanium Dioxide (TiO2) disordered nanoparticles.
- Analyzed near-infrared laser speckle patterns and temperature-induced hysteresis.
Main Results:
- Demonstrated that the laser speckle pattern of the R-PUF can be significantly altered by VO2 phase transition.
- Observed reconfigurable and reproducible optical responses with a distinct hysteresis loop.
- Validated the effectiveness of hysteresis for improved security and encoding capacity.
Conclusions:
- The proposed R-PUF offers a novel approach to hardware security with tunable optical responses.
- The hysteretic characteristic provides an additional dimension for PUF security and encoding.
- The R-PUF is a promising primitive for robust authentication and encryption applications.
