Generation of physical random digits using diode noise and its statisticalproperties

This study deals with a method of random number generation using hardware a s a source of random signals. The random signals are produced by shot noise generated by a Zener diode and are converted into sequences of high-qualit y random numbers. The proposed method is an improvement compared to convent ional hardware-based methods due to the fact that randomness of generated n umbers is not affected by irregular performance characteristics of the hard ware. This new method was verified by generating approximately 1.2 x 10(9) decimal random integers and by testing such characteristics of the generate d random number sequences as their uniformity and independence by statistic al methods. Results of the verification confirmed that characteristics of t he random sequences obtained by this method were most satisfactory. (C) 200 1 Scripta Technica.