Talks & Presentations
2025
The Wright Approach to Ocean Data
Possibility Ocean 2025
π Newport, RI
When it comes to scaling ocean data, what if we started with the price target instead of the technology? Dr. Ravi Pappu of Apeiron Labs proposes a new approach that shifts the focus from an engineering problem to an economic one. In this keynote, Dr. Pappu explores how cost influences accessibility, innovation, and scalability, and uncovers new possibilities for how we gather, use, and share ocean data.
2024
SpaceX for Oceans
S2G Summit
π Chicago, Il
Ravi Pappu, CEO of Apeiron Labs, addresses the environmental importance of obtaining upper ocean data, what excites him about ocean exploration, and his companyβs goal to establish a global network of subsurface devices and create data-as-a-service platform for the oceans
2023
Physical Unclonable Functions: The First Fifty Years
ASHES 23 Keynote
π Copenhagen
For over twenty years, Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs) have spurred innovation in hardware security, giving rise to novel systems, protocols, attacks, and a deeper understanding of extracting entropy from the inherent disorder in physical structures. Despite this progress, a crucial gap remains. In this talk, I'll recount the (un)fortunate events that led me to discover PUFs and share key highlights of PUF research since. Looking back from a vantage point twenty years in the future, I'll explore some desired results required to bridge the gap and establish a theoretical framework for unclonability.
2018
Technology Genomes and Innovation
Neo4j Graphtour
I gave this talk on how InQTel uses graph databases to help us navigate the Mission Economy - the connection between startups, problems faced by the Intelligence Community, and the evolution of technology capabilities. The slides for this event are not public, but a case study (see link below) was published by Neo4j.
Deep Learning: Promise and Pitfalls
NVTC Tech Titans 2018
π Arlington, VA
I moderated a panel at the Northern Virginia Technology Council on the promise and panels of Deep Learning.
2017
IoT Capabilities
MIT IoT Bootcamp
π Cambridge, MA
Slides from a 90-minute talk I gave at the first MIT IoT Bootcamp.
2011
Conway's Law and Innovation: a conjecture
Multiple locations
I have give this talk several times over the past decade. It's primarily aimed at management to alert them to the hidden influence of organizational structures on innovation...or, why companies who get really good at one thing often have a very hard time doing something radically different.
The Making of Camels
RFID Security Workshop
π Amherst, MA
Sir Alec Issigonis, the designer of the Mini, is known to have said that "a camel is a horse designed by a committee." In this talk, I will attempt to illuminate the process of how modern RFID standards are made through three examples. My goal is to convey the forces that make modern RFID standards as complicated as they are, and why it is usually very difficult for academic research to make its way into such standards in the short term.
The Physics of RFID
RFID Security Workshop, 2011
π Amherst, MA
Matt Reynolds and I gave a tutorial on the physics of RFID and UHF protocols at the RFID Security Workshop in June, 2011.
Passive RFID Innovation
MIT Auto-ID SIG
π Cambridge, MA
This is a short talk on the innovation that I expected in passive RFID during 2011-2015
2008
Reality Search Engines
Google Tech Talk
A Google Tech Talk in Cambridge, MA. I spoke about how passive RFID is enabling Reality Search Engines - the ability to search physical space as easily as digital space.
RFID Privacy Without Killing
RFID CUSP Workshop, Johns Hopkins University
π Baltimore, MD
We explore the problem of secret-key distribution in unidirectional channels, those in which a sender transmits information blindly to a receiver. We consider two approaches: (1) Key sharing across space, i.e., via simultaneously emitted values that may follow different data paths and (2) Key sharing across time, i.e., in temporally staggered emissions. Our constructions are of general interest, treating, for instance, the basic problem of constructing highly compact secret shares. Our main motivating problem, however, is practical key management in RFID (Radio-Frequency IDentification) systems. We describe the application of our techniques to RFID-enabled supply chains and a prototype privacy-enhancing system.
2002
Physical One-Way Functions
Security Seminar, Cambridge University, UK
π Cambridge University, UK
Modern cryptographic practice rests on the use of one-way functions, which are easy to evaluate but difficult to invert. Unfortunately, commonly used one-way functions are either based on unproven conjectures or have known vulnerabilities. We show that instead of relying on number theory, the mesoscopic physics of coherent transport through a disordered medium can be used to allocate and authenticate unique identifiers by physically reducing the medium's microstructure to a fixed-length string of binary digits. These physical one-way functions are inexpensive to fabricate, prohibitively difficult to duplicate, admit no compact mathematical representation, and are intrinsically tamper-resistant. We provide an authentication protocol based on the enormous address space that is a principal characteristic of physical one-way functions.
