Research

My research interests span cryptography, computer security, and privacy with a large focus on blockchain-based systems and distributed protocols. Broadly, I work on interdisciplinary projects that combine knowledge from various fields toward the design of secure and efficient systems and protocols. In my research, I look for real life problems and build solutions backed by rigorous theoretical foundations as well as efficient implementations and thorough performance testing. I also work on conceptual projects that aim to bridge the gap between theory and practice of cryptography.

Current Projects

  • Web 3.0 Scalability: Develop secure sidechain-based frameworks for boosting performance and improving scalability of Web 3.0 applications, in particular the paradigm of blockchain-based resource markets and AMMs. We developed two frameworks so far: chainBoost (paper, EuroS&P’24) for resource markets, and ammBoost (paper, DSN’25) for AMMs. This is in addition to laying down foundations of modular provable security for these systems. We further developed competitive online policies for collateral management in layer-two protocols and their applications that can be found in our (paper, AFT’24).

  • Private computing for blockchains: Explore the utility of fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) and non-interactive zero knowledge proofs (NIZKs) in the context of private computing over blockchains. We systematized private computing solutions for blockchains (SoK paper, EuroS&P’22), offering insights and valuable directions for future work. Then, we designed a privacy-preserving smart contract framework, smartFHE (paper, EuroS&P’23), that combines FHE and NIZKs to achieve input/output privacy for smart contracts. Furthermore, we developed an FHE compiler, Parasol (paper), that shows how to bootstrap in FHE efficiently, and automates the process of producing highly performant FHE programs.

  • Delegation of cryptographic capabilities: Build constructions for delegating cryptographic capabilities, such as digital signatures, that are timed, revocable and anonymous, and explore their applications to Web 3.0. More about acheiving this notion for proxy signatures can be found in our (paper, ISC’24).

  • Basing cryptography on biochemical assumptions: Construct bounded-query memory devices, or consumable tokens, from proteins, and use them in various cryptographic applications such as digital lockers and bounded-execution programs. More about these biological consumable tokens, their security and applications, can be found in our (paper, Eurocrypt’22). Also, for a comparison of the no-cloning principle of unclonable polymers and that of quantum computing, in terms of building unclonable cryptography, check our (paper, Secrypt’23). In a more recent (paper, CSCML’24), we show how consumable tokens can be used to contruct password-authenticated cryptography.