Her research focuses on the security of digital systems, particularly secure hardware, resource-efficient cryptographic primitives, fault-tolerant architectures, and the protection of AI-driven systems from both internal and external manipulation. She aims to develop robust, trustworthy technologies that maintain their integrity even under adversarial or mission-critical conditions.
Academic Background
Since 05/2025 Head of the Secure Digital Systems research group, Barkhausen Institut, Dresden Professor, Chair for Secure Digital Systems, Faculty of Computer Science, Technische Universität Dresden
04/2021 – 04/2025 Tenure-track Assistant Professor of Secure Intelligent Systems, Faculty of Computer Science and Mathematics, University of Passau
10/2020 – 03/2021 Interim Assistant Professor of Secure Intelligent Systems, University of Passau
01/2019 – 09/2020 Lecturer in Cybersecurity, Security of Advanced Systems (SoAS) group, Department of Computer Science, University of Sheffield, UK
06/2011 – 11/2014 Research Associate, Chair for Embedded Security (EmSec), Horst Görtz Institute for IT Security, Ruhr University Bochum, Germany
01/2011 – 05/2011 Research Associate, Fraunhofer AISEC (formerly Fraunhofer SIT), Garching near Munich, Germany
03/2008 – 06/2008 Research Intern, TIMA Laboratory, Grenoble Institute of Technology (INPG), Grenoble, France
Industry Experience
01/2018 – 12/2018 Staff Engineer Digital Design, Digital Security Solutions (DSS), Infineon Technologies AG, Munich, Germany
08/2007 – 09/2007 Intern, Crypto Team, Aselsan Electronics, Ankara, Turkey
05/2007 – 07/2007 Intern, Synplicity, Izmir & Ankara, Turkey
Education
06/2011 – 02/2015 PhD in Engineering (Dr.-Ing.) in Embedded Security, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology, Ruhr University Bochum, Germany
08/2008 – 09/2010 Master of Science (M.Sc.) in Cryptography, Middle East Technical University (METU), Ankara, Turkey
09/2004 – 07/2008 Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) in Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Izmir Institute of Technology (IzTech), Izmir, Turkey
01/2008 – 06/2008 Erasmus Exchange Student, Polytech Grenoble, Université Joseph Fourier – Grenoble I, France
George Attia, Martin Schmid, Elif Kavun,
A Multi-head CNN-based Side-channel Attack on the Energy-efficient DIZY Stream Cipher,
2026 Constructive Approaches for Security analysis and Design of Embedded Systems Conference,
2026
@inproceedings{
attiaCASCADE26,
title = "A Multi-head CNN-based Side-channel Attack on the Energy-efficient DIZY Stream Cipher",
author = "George Attia, Martin Schmid, Elif Kavun",
year = "2026",
booktitle = "2026 Constructive Approaches for Security analysis and Design of Embedded Systems Conference",
month = "March"
}
Ali Sakar, Elif Kavun,
TRACEFORMER: Trace-Efficient and Robust Transformer-Based Late-Fusion Side-Channel Analysis of Masked AES,
2026 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems,
2026
@inproceedings{
sakarISCAS26,
title = "TRACEFORMER: Trace-Efficient and Robust Transformer-Based Late-Fusion Side-Channel Analysis of Masked AES",
author = "Ali Sakar, Elif Kavun",
year = "2026",
booktitle = "2026 IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems",
month = "May"
}
Deborah Abugah, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Tolga Arul, Stavros Stavrinides, Elif Kavun, Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos,
Post-Quantum Secure Real-Time Temperature Monitoring for Smart IoT Irrigation,
IEEE 44th International Conference on Consumer Electronics,
2026
@inproceedings{
abugahICCE26,
title = "Post-Quantum Secure Real-Time Temperature Monitoring for Smart IoT Irrigation",
author = "Deborah Abugah, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Tolga Arul, Stavros Stavrinides, Elif Kavun, Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos",
year = "2026",
booktitle = "IEEE 44th International Conference on Consumer Electronics",
month = "February"
}
Martin Schmid, Giuseppe Manzoni, Aydin Aysu, Elif Kavun,
The Fellowship of the Leak: Power Analysis of a Masked FrodoKEM Hardware Accelerator,
2025 IEEE/ACM International Conference on Computer Aided Design (ICCAD),
2025
@inproceedings{
schmidICCAD25,
title = "The Fellowship of the Leak: Power Analysis of a Masked FrodoKEM Hardware Accelerator",
author = "Martin Schmid, Giuseppe Manzoni, Aydin Aysu, Elif Kavun",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "2025 IEEE/ACM International Conference on Computer Aided Design (ICCAD)",
month = "October",
pages = "1-8",
doi = "10.1109/ICCAD66269.2025.11240695"
}
Ethan Cornett, Rahul Magesh, Sharath Pendyala, Elif Kavun, Aydin Aysu,
Deus Ex LLMs: AI vs Humans in Post-Quantum Cryptographic Hardware Code Generation,
2025 IFIP/IEEE 33rd International Conference On Very Large Scale Integration (VLSISoC),
2025
@inproceedings{
cornettVLSISoC25,
title = "Deus Ex LLMs: AI vs Humans in Post-Quantum Cryptographic Hardware Code Generation",
author = "Ethan Cornett, Rahul Magesh, Sharath Pendyala, Elif Kavun, Aydin Aysu",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "2025 IFIP/IEEE 33rd International Conference On Very Large Scale Integration (VLSISoC)",
month = "October"
}
Martin Schmid, Simon Böttger, Martin Ernst, Martin Hartmann, Sascha Hermann, Elif Kavun, Stefan Katzenbeisser,
Towards the FPGA Platform Integration of Carbon-Nanotubes in Physical Unclonable Functions,
CPS Summer School PHD Workshop (CPSWS'25),
2025
, Download PDF
@inproceedings{
schmidCPSWS25,
title = "Towards the FPGA Platform Integration of Carbon-Nanotubes in Physical Unclonable Functions",
author = "Martin Schmid, Simon Böttger, Martin Ernst, Martin Hartmann, Sascha Hermann, Elif Kavun, Stefan Katzenbeisser",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "CPS Summer School PHD Workshop (CPSWS'25)",
month = "September"
}
Anila Hoxha, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Talaya Farasat, Joachim Posegga, Elif Kavun,
FPGA-Accelerated Neural Networks for Real-Time Anomaly Detection using High-Level Synthesis,
CPS Summer School PHD Workshop (CPSWS'25),
2025
, Download PDF
@inproceedings{
hoxhaCPSWS25,
title = "FPGA-Accelerated Neural Networks for Real-Time Anomaly Detection using High-Level Synthesis",
author = "Anila Hoxha, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Talaya Farasat, Joachim Posegga, Elif Kavun",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "CPS Summer School PHD Workshop (CPSWS'25)",
month = "September"
}
Giuseppe Manzoni, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Elif Kavun,
An Optimized FrodoKEM Implementation on Reconfigurable Hardware,
6th International Workshop on Lightweight Cryptography for Security & Privacy (LightSec),
2025
@inproceedings{
manzoniLightSec25,
title = "An Optimized FrodoKEM Implementation on Reconfigurable Hardware",
author = "Giuseppe Manzoni, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Elif Kavun",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "6th International Workshop on Lightweight Cryptography for Security & Privacy (LightSec)",
month = "September",
pages = "97-113",
doi = "10.1007/978-3-032-15541-2_6"
}
Martin Schmid, Elif Kavun,
Differential Power Analysis on Low-Energy Keystream Generating Hardware: Full-State Recovery in DIZY Implementation,
IEEE 36th International Conference on Application-specific Systems, Architectures and Processors (ASAP),
2025
@inproceedings{
schmidASAP25,
title = "Differential Power Analysis on Low-Energy Keystream Generating Hardware: Full-State Recovery in DIZY Implementation",
author = "Martin Schmid, Elif Kavun",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "IEEE 36th International Conference on Application-specific Systems, Architectures and Processors (ASAP)",
month = "July",
pages = "147-154",
doi = "10.1109/ASAP65064.2025.00032"
}
Shekoufeh Neisarian, Elif Kavun,
MT-TMVP: Modular Tiled TMVP-based Polynomial Multiplication for Post-Quantum Cryptography on FPGAs,
25th International Conference on Embedded Computer Systems: Architectures, Modeling, and Simulation (SAMOS),
2025
, Download PDF
@inproceedings{
neisarianSAMOS25,
title = "MT-TMVP: Modular Tiled TMVP-based Polynomial Multiplication for Post-Quantum Cryptography on FPGAs",
author = "Shekoufeh Neisarian, Elif Kavun",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "25th International Conference on Embedded Computer Systems: Architectures, Modeling, and Simulation (SAMOS)",
month = "June"
}
Joseph Chang, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Nico Mexis, Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos, Tolga Arul, Elif Kavun,
Ternary PUF-based Secure Mutual Authentication Using RNNs for Sequence Learning in Response Classification,
21st International Conference on Synthesis, Modeling, Analysis and Simulation Methods and Applications to Circuit Design (SMACD),
2025
@inproceedings{
changSMACD25,
title = "Ternary PUF-based Secure Mutual Authentication Using RNNs for Sequence Learning in Response Classification",
author = "Joseph Chang, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Nico Mexis, Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos, Tolga Arul, Elif Kavun",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "21st International Conference on Synthesis, Modeling, Analysis and Simulation Methods and Applications to Circuit Design (SMACD)",
month = "July",
pages = "1-4",
doi = "10.1109/SMACD65553.2025.11091973"
}
Selma Brimah, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Elif Kavun, Stefan Katzenbeisser, Tolga Arul, Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos,
An Evaluation of LM35 Temperature Sensors as Physical Unclonable Functions,
2025 IEEE Zooming Innovation in Consumer Technologies Conference (ZINC),
2025
, Download PDF
@inproceedings{
brimahZINC25,
title = "An Evaluation of LM35 Temperature Sensors as Physical Unclonable Functions",
author = "Selma Brimah, Shekoufeh Neisarian, Elif Kavun, Stefan Katzenbeisser, Tolga Arul, Nikolaos Anagnostopoulos",
year = "2025",
booktitle = "2025 IEEE Zooming Innovation in Consumer Technologies Conference (ZINC)",
month = "May",
pages = "86-91",
doi = "10.1109/ZINC65316.2025.11103559"
}
