From perfect numbers to modern primality tests

Document Type

Presentation Abstract

Presentation Date

12-2-2011

Abstract

We briefly describe the ideas and results which have led to finding very large prime numbers, and to finding efficient ways of distinguishing prime numbers from composite numbers. Our story begins with Ancient Greeks and perfect numbers, it includes the ideas and contributions of Fermat in the 17th century, Euler in the 18th, Lucas in the 19th, the huge amount of progress in the area of primality tests during the 20th century, and the celebrated result of Agrawal, Kayal, and Saxena, which in 2002 surprised the international scientific community with the discovery of the first general polynomial-time primality test. We also describe the so-called "practical version" of AKS, in which we played a part. We end by discussing some contributions on the subject obtained by our research group.

Additional Details

Friday, 2 December 2011
3:10 p.m. in Math 103
4:00 p.m. Refreshments in Math Lounge 109

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