A chaos-based random number generator for eight-bit micro-controller system

Random number generators are widely used in different applications. However, it is difficult to obtain a good random number generator in low precision and resource constrained system, such as an eight-bit micro-controller system which is still commonly used in industrial and consumer markets. This paper provides a practical solution for this problem based on chaotic systems. By the use of a modified Chua's circuit, it is demonstrated that the sampled state, after post-processing by a high-dimensional chaotic map, can be used as a random source even in an eight-bit environment. The randomness of the generated sequence is testified and confirmed by different statistical tests and the up-to-date statistical suite. © 2008 World Scientific Publishing Company.