The workshop Trends in Theoretical Cryptography (TTC 2011) hosted by the Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences opened on Jan 9, 2011. Prof. Andrew Chi-Chih Yao, Dean of IIIS, Prof. Amy Yuexuan Wang, Deputy Dean, and Prof. Periklis A. Papakonstantinou, workshop Technical Program Chair joined the opening ceremony.

Prof. Amy Wang hosted the opening and extended warm welcome to participants on behalf of the Organizing Committee. She introduced the significance of hosting the workshop as theory of Cryptography lies in the intersection of Cryptography and Theoretical Computer Science. It aims to provide rigorous mathematical treatment in the process of conceptualizing cryptographic tasks. This area has been exhibiting a remarkable growth in the recent years.

In his remarks, Prof. Yao introduced the establishment of Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Sciences (IIIS) which hosts Institute for Theoretical Computer Science (ITCS), Center for Quantum Information (CQI), and Tsinghua-MIT-CUHK Research Center for Theoretical Computer Science (CTCS). Prof. Yao also mentioned that Cryptography as an important research area in computer science, is of great importance to mathematics and economics.

Trends in Theoretical Cryptography is an invitation-only workshop, open to the public to attend. It puts forward fundamental topics in Cryptography with a special focus on three, currently among the most active, areas of theoretical cryptography. The workshop runs in three days. Each day is associated with a distinct theme, namely Efficient constructions and non-black-box techniques in Cryptography, Black-box complexity of cryptographic tasks and Leakage-resilient Cryptography. A total of 21 scholars, including Prof. Silvio Micali from MIT and Prof. Ueli Mauer from ETH gave talks at the workshop.