Schools from around the globe compete to successfully crack this year's Cipher Challenge
After months of perseverance, school teams from around the world have successfully solved the 9th National Cipher Challenge, a UK schools outreach programme run by Mathematics.
Competitors took part in a series of codebreaking challenges which told the story of efforts to prevent Nazi sympathisers from building a terrifying weapon. Over 740 UK schools registered for the competition this year with additional entries from schools in Australia, China, Japan, Kuwait, Malaysia and the US.
Prizes were sponsored by the government codebreaking division at GCHQ, by IBM, the University of Southampton and by Trinity College Cambridge.
A driving force for maths
Longtime competitor Julian Bhardwaj, who has applied to study mathematics at Southampton next year, wrote, "If I were to name one thing with has undoubtedly influenced my academic drive, interests and overall career to date, it would be the National Cipher Challenge. Since being introduced to cryptography and the challenge in Year 8, it has been my one passion and driving force in pursuing further education in maths."
The prize giving event will be held in April 2011 at Bletchley Park, home of the Second World War code breakers.
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Since being introduced to cryptography and the challenge in Year 8, it has been my one passion and driving force in pursuing further education in Maths