Physical Layer Security for Wireless and Quantum Communications.docVIP

Physical Layer Security for Wireless and Quantum Communications 　　This special issue is dedicated to security problems in wireless and quantum communications. Papers for this issue were invited， and after peer review， eight were selected for publication. The first part of this issue comprises four papers on recent advances in physical layer security for wireless networks. The second part comprises another four papers on quantum communications. 　　Wireless networks have become pervasive in order to guarantee global digital connectivity， and wireless devices have quickly evolved into multimedia smartphones running applications that demand high-speed data connections. Multiuser multiple-input multiple-output （MIMO） wireless techniques meet this demand by achieving high spectral efficiency. Security is also regarded as critical in wireless multiuser networks because users rely on these networks to transmit sensitive data. Because of the broadcast nature of the physical medium， wireless multiuser communication is very susceptible to eavesdropping， and it is essential to protect transmitted information. Wireless communications have traditionally been secured by network layer key-based cryptography. However， in large， dynamic wireless networks， classical cryptography might not be suitable. Classical cryptography tends to cause problems in terms of key distribution and management （for symmetric cryptosystems） and computational complexity （for asymmetric cryptosystems）. Moreover， classical cryptography is potentially vulnerable because it relies on the unproven assumption that certain mathematical functions are difficult to invert. Recently， methods have been proposed to provide an additional level of protection and to achieve perfect secrecy without encryption keys. These methods， collectively referred to as physical layer security， exploit the randomness inherent in noisy channels. Physical layer security has been identified as the highest form of security and will be